“The college experience “ has been a very very successful ad campaign to induce parents to spend ever more money on college. It’s working perfectly.
It so hard to explain to students that COVID is a nightmare pandemic illness that could have life long repercussions. The media is no help because the cases seem sensational “fake news”
Yes I’m scared that my college aged DCs will contract COVID. They are in denial about their own health issues and will do about anything to “get back to normal”. That this is the new normal hadn’t registered with them yet.
I’m afraid for their return. Also.

A New York Times survey of every public four-year college in the country, as well as every private institution that competes in Division I sports or is a member of an elite group of research universities, revealed at least 6,300 cases tied to about 270 colleges over the course of the pandemic. And the new academic year has not even begun at most schools.


https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/28/us/covid-19-colleges-universities.html?referringSource=articleShare

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The science is clear: a campus with many students living together in an area with a COVID infection rate above 5% will lead to students getting sick. It doesn't matter if your kid locks himself in his dorm every night or goes to crowded parties seven days a week, avoiding the virus in a crowded living situation is nearly impossible. How sick and with what permanent effects can be debated in Parenting forums for months...

The real question is: If your college student becomes part of the 9-15% that gets *seriously* ill, how will you be able to live with your choice?

At this point, you can't say "we didn't realize how dangerous it was"....

We will learn a lot about on-campus infection rates before Thanksgiving --- Can you wait until then before making a choice?

Any source for saying 9-15% will get “seriously ill”? Or is that just a guess?

NP: The focus on the death rate <1% should not be the focus. Yes, 99% of people that contract the virus do not die, however, many are hospitalized or have longterm health issues. Most of the studies show that approx. 20% of people are sick for weeks even if they are not hospitalized and some of that group are experiencing long term health effects

See the following:


https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/07/418081/1-3-young-adults-may-face-severe-covid-19-ucsf-study-shows

https://www.uptodate.com/contents/coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19-clinical-features

https://theconversation.com/heres-what-we-know-so-far-about-the-long-term-symptoms-of-covid-19-142722

https://www.healthline.com/health-news/lifelong-lung-damage-the-serious-covid-19-complication-that-can-hit-people-in-their-20s

Anonymous wrote:As rates climb in the upper midwest, I am getting petrified.

Why petrified? Does you DC have an underlying condition? If not, the mortality risk is miniscule. In fact, in Virginia, with population of 8.5 million, ZERO people under 20 have died from COVID. Only 4 under 30. Higher risk operating a vehicle or crossing a street.

Gotta keep things in perspective.

I know. I think we need to seriously consider whether we should delegate this decision about our children's welfare to the colleges (which have a HUGE conflict of interest). I agree with the poster above (9:10 yesterday) who said this is one big experiment.

As rates climb in the upper midwest, I am getting petrified.

Anonymous wrote:We are pretty sure it was around my DD’s college in Feb. At the time, they thought it was a bad flu season but a number of students tested positive for antibodies. As far as I know, all finished their coursework. It’s scary but there is a risk here, too.

We also did have a bad flu season this year though. I got the flu and tested positive for flu B and had a hacking cough for weeks. Apparently the vaccine was a poor match. I work on a college campus and live in an area that was almost certainly not experiencing widespread community spread in February (we had very low case loads until this summer). Flu always hits college campuses hard, which means a contagious respiratory virus is going to be a disaster.

We are pretty sure it was around my DD’s college in Feb. At the time, they thought it was a bad flu season but a number of students tested positive for antibodies. As far as I know, all finished their coursework. It’s scary but there is a risk here, too.

Anonymous wrote:The science is clear: a campus with many students living together in an area with a COVID infection rate above 5% will lead to students getting sick. It doesn't matter if your kid locks himself in his dorm every night or goes to crowded parties seven days a week, avoiding the virus in a crowded living situation is nearly impossible. How sick and with what permanent effects can be debated in Parenting forums for months...

The real question is: If your college student becomes part of the 9-15% that gets *seriously* ill, how will you be able to live with your choice?

At this point, you can't say "we didn't realize how dangerous it was"....

We will learn a lot about on-campus infection rates before Thanksgiving --- Can you wait until then before making a choice?

Any source for saying 9-15% will get “seriously ill”? Or is that just a guess?

The science is clear: a campus with many students living together in an area with a COVID infection rate above 5% will lead to students getting sick. It doesn't matter if your kid locks himself in his dorm every night or goes to crowded parties seven days a week, avoiding the virus in a crowded living situation is nearly impossible. How sick and with what permanent effects can be debated in Parenting forums for months...

The real question is: If your college student becomes part of the 9-15% that gets *seriously* ill, how will you be able to live with your choice?

At this point, you can't say "we didn't realize how dangerous it was"....

We will learn a lot about on-campus infection rates before Thanksgiving --- Can you wait until then before making a choice?

Anonymous wrote:Many will and for over 99% of them in will be no big deal, at all. Most of them will never even know they contracted it. Your niece's parents need to calm down.

NP. You aren't keeping up. Increasing numbers of young adults are sick enough to be hospitalized -- it was increasing numbers of both cases and hospitalizations among young adults that drove much of the Florida spike that's still going on. Sure, older people have higher risk overall, but don't be naïve enough to believe that young adults are "99 percent" likely to be fine. You also seem unaware how much is unknown about this virus, or that there are increasing reports of long-term organ damage. Anecdotal at present but increasing and being studied.

Also: No one wants to talk about viral load. Having people living together in close quarters is a great way to have them catch it with a higher viral load. That increases the likelihood that the case will be more dangerous.

Plus: We have NO precedent on which to base any expectations of how the virus will move through a college population. None. Colleges closed quickly before there was any campus outbreak that would give us an example of what could happen. So we're sending tens of thousands of students back as a massive, nationwide medical experiment.

If you're blithely willing to swallow the simplistic belief that "college age adults will be fine," well, great, risk your own kid's and family's health on that.

Don't come back at me snarking "Well, do we wait for a vaccine and perfect immunity?" I'm not saying that. I'm saying parents need to get MUCH more realistic about all this and about the risk to their young adults. It is not automatically "like a bad cold" nor should we assume that "they'll all get it, then be immune, and it's fine." You do not know. More importantly, the best researchers and doctors Do. Not. Know. Wake up at least to the reality that your child could be fine or could get seriously ill.

I'm a professor. I'm in my 30s, and I'm teaching a small grad class in person (probably 5 students or fewer) in the fall (which I am totally comfortable with) and a larger class that is planned to be online in the spring. I'm not high risk and I go on campus and interact with my lab, which consists of a couple grad students, a postdoc, and a few undergraduates. We wear masks and try to stay 6 feet apart, but our research lab has been operational since May when the university reopened. Students do more remote work when they are writing or doing data analysis and are extra careful to stay home when they are feeling under the weather. So far things are working in our workplace, and I hope that some activities like this with a relatively small number of contacts can continue on campus. But there are only ~1700 people on campus at the moment which is essentially empty compared to the normal semester (mostly some staff, faculty and students who work in research labs, and some athletes) and we already have had 68 cases since the beginning of June. Most of these cases come from undergraduates that have been brought back.

I sat through our Dean's Town Hall on Friday regarding the precautions the university is taking. While I do think that hygiene and the degree of partying does make a difference and more social/risk accepting types are on the whole more likely to catch COVID, I think ANY student on campus (even "careful" introverted non-partying types) should be prepared that there is a pretty high chance they might get sick and they are almost certainly going to need to self-quarantine at some point over the course of the semester upon suspected exposure. Some might not get very sick at all, and some might get very sick for a few weeks. A few unlucky ones might need to be hospitalized. The university is prepared to give accomodations (extensions, make up exams, provide materials to keep up remotely even with an in person class), but this is something we all know WILL happen. If the student has any in person classes, they might go online for a while if the faculty member or TA needs to self-isolate. Recall their TAs are mostly 22-26 year old grad students, so it's not like they are the most risk adverse group either.

It's possible that with masks and people being more vigilant hygiene things can remain manageable without totally overwhelming the local healthcare system and with no student, faculty, or staff deaths. But if you send your child to a college campus, accept that there is a very good chance they will get sick (regardless if they are the "type" you would expect to get sick). If a high likelihood they will get sick is unacceptable, then do not send them to campus. This is not going away any time soon, so finding a balance of risk and benefit is important going forward, and that balance is going to differ for each student. The university has so many pressures coming from so many directions (many of which are financial) and this is just one big experiment.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know people on here are obsessed with the “college experience” and don’t care about, uh, the value of money, but dd is saving $7k by doing virtual from home this semester.

That's sad.

Different poster. Not sad at all! My son is the same. We are saving $6000 this semester so he doesn't need to take out a $5500 loan. If he also lives at home spring semester he won't need to take a loan sophomore year either.

I'm not sad about that at all. Money is a concern for us. I'd rather he get the campus experience but this year is not going to be normal at all.

I’m the one who posted about saving $7k. My kid’s cost for this semester will only be $3k and the total cost for the year will be $13k. That is worth it for us (we don’t have much savings for college). This was my kid’s idea.

Anonymous wrote:At 1 crowded college bar in Michigan in June it is thought that 1 person had covid. The bar had spaced tables and many persons though far from all were wearing masks. 102 persons at the bar that night caught covid. One person who caught it that night then further spread it to another 60 or so while attending an outdoor gathering the next night.

The thing is -- this disease spreads very, very easily. This is not HIV. This is like the the common cold in terms of how easy it spreads. Now -- not as many overall are dying from it though still large numbers -- 980 yesterday alone.
And, not as many younger people are dying from it. We are better at treating advanced serious cases now than we were in March and April. Still -- every case is potentially serious. I know 18 year olds with permanent lung lesions that will prevent them from participating in sports ever again. Lung lesions are pretty common for serious cases. They will always have to carry inhalers and avoid polluted areas/smog for the rest of their lives.

You know multiple 18-year-olds with "lung lesions" that will prevent them from ever playing sports again, from Covid? Yeah, sure you do.

Anonymous wrote:Your question has SUCH a victim blaming tone (the type of kid who will get COVID).

As a public health practitioner, that is really offensive to me.

If the kid breathes, he could get COVID.

Are some people less cautious, yes. But when you live in close quarters with hundreds/thousands of young people (some % of which are spreading an infectious disease without knowing they are even sick), you could well contract the virus THROUGH NO FAULT OF YOUR OWN.

Stop stigmatizing this illness, it is not helpful. Have compassion and humility. More than 4 million people have gotten COVID in six months in the US alone. That is because it is an organism that is very effective at spreading between humans.

Thank you for this reply! No more needs to be said on this thread