Benjamin Knorr, a 40-year-old single father in Janesville, Wisconsin, says there is a 50-50 chance that he will send his two teenage children to school this fall. Her 13-year-old son Aiden would especially like to get back to his friends, sports and everyday life. But Knorr, an independent contractor, has asthma and fears that his health and finances will be jeopardized if one of his boys takes COVID-19 home from school.
“If the numbers increase in Dane County and Rock County, where I work and live, it’s over. We’re just doing online school, “says Knorr. “We have already spent two months and yes, it was difficult. It was stressful. And yes, it was more work on my part to go home and study online with them and stuff. But we can’t be homeless. “
As school districts across the United States decide whether to welcome children into the classroom for in-person education this fall, administrators are weighing a complex set of variables. There is a risk that children, teachers, and staff will get sick or spread the disease, on the one hand. But on the other hand, there is evidence that being out of school can degrade children’s long-term learning prospects and mental health; making it difficult for many to get the food they need; and make it difficult for fathers, especially mothers, who are often expected to take care of a disproportionate amount of childcare tasks. Meanwhile, millions of students lack access to high-speed broadband Internet and other technological resources necessary to take full advantage of remote learning, making it an inappropriate substitute for many.
Meanwhile, the debate over reopening schools has become highly politicized. United States President Donald Trump and many other Republicans are pushing schools to reopen, in part because they want American life to feel as normal as possible before Election Day in November. But many Democrats say it is too early to go back to school, and that the lives of children and teachers must not be put at risk before a vaccine is ready.
Putting politics aside, what the science shows so far is this: Young children may be less likely to get sick from COVID-19 and rarely become seriously ill if they show symptoms, and appear to be less likely to infect other people. . This June study, which examined epidemiological data from China and five other countries, found that people under the age of 20 are about half as likely to be infected as older people, and only 21% of people 10 to 19 years old. getting infected show symptoms.
To complicate matters in the US, experts tell TIME, is that American schools closed early in the pandemic and have remained closed ever since; therefore, we don’t have very good data on how the virus spreads in US classrooms.The best we have so far comes from a large study from South Korea published earlier this month. After contact tracked approximately 5,700 COVID-19 patients, the researchers found that children younger than 10 years old transmit the virus at about half the rate of adults, but children ages 10-19 transmit it to a rate similar to that of adults (although the study included fewer people in that age group than adults). This suggests that administrators and policy makers should think differently about middle and high school students than younger students. “What I take home from that is that it’s an age continuum,” says Dr. William Raszka, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at the University of Vermont. “The older you are, the more likely you are to have a transmission similar to that of adults.”
South Korea’s findings coincide with those of other smaller studies. Research in French primary schools published as a preprint in June found no evidence of transmission by children in schools; and an Iceland investigation published in April found that children under the age of 10 were less likely to test positive for the virus than those over the age of 10. Another small study published in July, based on data from hospitals in the Chinese cities of Wuhan and Qingdao. , found that, among 68 pediatric COVID-19 patients, 96% were infected by another adult in their home, and there was no evidence that the children transmitted the virus to others (it is not clear in the study how the other was infected 4% of children).
There could be a number of reasons why younger people are less likely to spread COVID-19, says Justin Lessler, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The virus may not replicate in both children and adults, which means that an infected child would have less viral material to transmit. Also, because children generally have no symptoms or are less severe, they are less likely to transmit the virus by coughing or sneezing, as a sick adult would.
Still, that could be a mixed blessing, Lessler says: If a child is infected but doesn’t appear to be sick, they could be sent to school and end up infecting others. “It is a compensation,” she says. “If they are not removing many viruses, it may be less likely, but they may have much more contact because they are not sick.” In the absence of adequate health guarantees, that could be a big problem for schools. School-age children tend to have more contact with other people than adults while school is in session. And even if they are not coughing or sneezing, children are generally very good at transmitting the disease through other habits, such as touching everything in sight or crying.
Another big question is whether asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic children can transmit the virus – Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, a physician and pediatric infectious disease epidemiologist at Stanford Medicine, notes that the aforementioned South Korean study only traced the contacts of symptomatic children.
One thing we do know: About a quarter of teachers in the US are at increased risk for serious illness from COVID-19, according to a July analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation, because they have more than 65 years old, have a pre-existing condition, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. disease (COPD), or a body mass index greater than 40. And unfortunately, discussions of children’s vulnerability to COVID-19 often avoid the issue of whether the reopening of schools threatens the lives of teachers. and other employees. Randi Weingarten, head of the American Federation of Teachers, gave the green light on July 28 for union members to undertake so-called “security strikes” in protest of unsafe working conditions. “If the authorities do not protect the safety and health of those we represent and whom we serve,” she told union members, NPR reports, “nothing is off the table.”
There are ways to help reduce risk, says Maldonado: Precautions like social distancing, having teachers wear masks and face shields, and dividing children into smaller groups and staggering their school days can help. (Some of those measures, especially social distancing, will be tougher in crowded schools or schools with fewer resources.) “We have not seen transmission when the proper precautions are taken,” says Maldonado. “So what I would like to know as a parent is what my school is doing to make sure those precautions are in place. And that’s the key. If the school can do it, I would feel comfortable. If the school doesn’t seem to really act together, or doesn’t have the resources, then I might be concerned about that. ”
If a certain school or district can safely reopen, it can ultimately be linked to the situation of the wider community: if a certain state or county is experiencing a significant outbreak, it may be wise to keep the school doors closed. .
“You can’t easily separate schools from the community,” says Raszka, the University of Vermont specialist. “They are not totally separate. And if you really want to minimize the risk of transmission in schools, you must minimize the risk in the community. “
