Cornell researchers are leading a living systematic review on the risk of transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) through breast milk intake and breastfeeding.
Findings will inform the World Health Organizations (WHO) international guidelines on breastfeeding during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dr. Saurabh Mehta and Julia Finkelstein, both associate professors in Cornells Division of Nutritional Sciences, are leading the ongoing effort. Mehta is a physician and infectious disease epidemiologist and leads an acute febrile illness surveillance program in Ecuador. Finkelstein specializes in maternal and child health and leads a community-based surveillance program among reproductive-age women in Southern India.
Breastfeeding is the cornerstone for ensuring that children get a healthy start in life, Mehta said, but it also may be the source of transmission of some infections from mother to child.
The ongoing pandemic is expected to lead to major global increases in childhood malnutrition due to multiple factors, including the reduction in food quality and access, and an interruption in feeding programs, Mehta said.
One of the World Health Organizations critical functions is to develop guidelines for what should be done in these times, Mehta said. With the anticipated risk to child health and nutrition due to the pandemic, its important to determine the role of breast milk and breastfeeding in transmission of the virus, if any.
When COVID-19 first appeared in January, the review team examined hundreds of papers and reports to inform WHOs emergency guidelines for breastfeeding and COVID-19.
As of July 7, the team had screened 19,414 scientific articles and found 309 studies that reported on breastfeeding among women with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 and their infants. Among these, 38 studies included a molecular-based assessment of breast milk samples for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
In a WHO scientific brief posted online June 23, the organization recommended that mothers with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 cases should be encouraged to initiate or continue to breastfeed. The paper, Transmission of Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) Through Breast Milk and Breastfeeding: A Living Systematic Review, which informs the WHOs recommendation, has been accepted and will be published in a forthcoming issue of the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.
This highlights the need for additional studies that not only report on the presence of viral particles within breast milk, but to understand if these particles are infectious, Finkelstein said. As new evidence emerges, our team will continue to synthesize and report on relevant data to help inform infant feeding guidelines in the context of COVID-19.
The Cornell review team members also include:
The WHO collaborators include: Dr. Juan Pablo Pea-Rosas, head of Cross-cutting Global Initiatives in the Department of Nutrition and Food Safety; Dr. Pura Rayco-Solon, a scientist in the Department of Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health and Aging; Maria Nieves Garcia-Casal, nutrition scientist; and Lisa Rogers, technical officer in the Department of Nutrition and Food Safety.
Funding for this ongoing research is provided by the WHO.
Every time you make progress you are pushed back by either a natural or political catastrophe, says Marie Marcelle Deschamps.
By Robert BazellAug. 13, 2020 , 2:30 PM
Science's COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Heising-Simons Foundation.
Marie Marcelle Deschamps remembers the first patient with COVID-19 to visit a clinic she runs in Portau-Prince, Haiti. It was late March. His blood oxygen saturation, normally above 90%, was 35%. The 45-year-old man died within 1 hour. Oh my God, she recalls telling her colleagues. Its here.
As the director of a major health care organization in Haiti, Deschamps was already stretched thin by the struggles of providing medical help in one of the poorest nations on Earth. Her clinic was soon seeing thousands of COVID-19 cases per week, and her days became consumed with treating patients, supervising the other doctors, and dispatching teams to provide care and counseling to people in Haitis urban slums and countryside.
Those who have met Deschamps (including this reporter) know her as amazingly warm, bright, and charming. Clinic staff, patients, and even strangers greet her fondly as she rushes past. The need for women to take an increasing role in Haitis health care has long been identified as a key to economic development, and after 4 decades of practicing medicine in her native country, Deschamps is seen by many as an icon and a role model. She is inspiring, says Sandra Lamarque, head of mission in Haiti for Doctors Without Borders.
Jean William Pape, founding director of GHESKIO, the private nonprofit health organization Deschamps now heads, credits her for introducing multiple programs that have improved womens health and wellbeing, including ones that care for victims of sexual assault, guide poor women in obtaining microcredit loans to start businesses, or help them get their children into schools. When she sets out to solve a problem, it gets solved, says Pape, who now co-directs Haitis response to COVID-19.
Deschamps decided on a career in medicine after witnessing her father die a slow death from kidney failure. I had such a desire to become a good doctor, she says. The beginning of her career coincided with the huge outbreak in Haiti of the disease that came to be called HIV/AIDS, before there were meaningful treatments. She recalls telling her husband, I am signing so many death certificates I hope that one day people wont judge me for being a bad doctor.
In the early days of the HIV/AIDS crisis, a group of senior Haitian and U.S. doctors chose Deschamps to study in the United States, where she did fellowships in Anthony Faucis lab at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Walter Reed military hospital, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. On her return to Haiti, she and Pape expanded GHESKIO. It grew from humble origins in a tiny building across the street from an enormous slum known as City of God into a health organization that now treats more Haitians with HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis than any other group in Haiti, as well as caring for people with myriad other maladies.
Deschamps sees COVID-19 as just the latest chapter in the Haitian saga. Every time you make progress, finding the solutions, you are pushed back by either a natural or political catastrophe, she says. You are always in a situation of crisis where you have to act rapidly. After the devastating 2010 earthquake, Deschampss clinic allowed hundreds of slum dwellers whose shacks had collapsed to camp on its property. She and her colleagues circulated among the injured treating horrible fractures and other injuries.
Soon after the earthquake, U.N. troops from Nepal unknowingly brought a cholera epidemic to Haiti that sickened more than 800,000 and killed more than 10,000 over several years, putting enormous additional stress on all of Haitis health facilities, including Deschampss clinics. The country has been very vulnerable, Deschamps says, citing threats as diverse as political destabilization, impacts of deforestation on farmland and drinking water sources, hurricanes, and a never-ending procession of infectious diseases. Now COVID, she says with a laugh. So, I said to my myself, what is it we have not seen finally.
Until Deschamps saw her first COVID-19 patient in late March, Haitis poverty and isolation had kept it relatively safe from the pandemic. The government had taken precautions, closing the international airport and shutting down businesses. Two infected travelers, one from the United States and one from Europe, had been discovered and quickly isolated.
But the patient in her clinicand others who quickly followedhad been working at hotels in the Dominican Republic, which shares a porous border with Haiti on the island of Hispaniola. Because it is a popular winter tourist destination for people from the northeastern United States and Europe, the Dominican Republic got hit hard and early with COVID-19. More than 30,000 Haitians lost their jobs there and were either forced out or fled homesome bringing the virus with them. Another 300,000 had commuted back and forth for occasional work.
For several weeks, Haiti saw large numbers of COVID-19 cases, often overwhelming the relatively few available hospital beds. Because many Haitians lack shelter, food, and medical care, the United Nations Economic and Social Council warned that COVID-19 could trigger a humanitarian catastrophe, a theme echoed in a letter co-authored by Deschamps and published on 16 June inThe New England Journal of Medicinetitled Facing the Monster in Haiti.
The letter warned that stigmatizationonce directed against those with HIVwas now impeding care for those with COVID-19. Health care workers have endured threats and had stones thrown at them. Some patients have been driven from their homes and shunned by relatives, forcing them to live on the streets. Deschamps has directed community health workers to try to combat stigma and educate people about safety measures, but she acknowledges it isnt easy. How can you ask someone to adopt proper distancing measures when five people are living in one room?
So far, however, the worst predictions havent come to pass. Although testing and surveillance is limited, the official number of confirmed cases declined from almost 300 per day in mid-June to about 100 in mid-July. As of 9 August, Haiti had reported only 183 COVID-19 deaths in its population of 11.2 million. Deschamps says that even at current levels COVID-19 represents a huge burden, but she is hopeful and skeptical at the same time about the future.
Some other resource-poor countries have reported similar declines in cases. Global health experts have speculated that those countries may benefit from relatively younger populations, shanties that though crowded are well-ventilated, or a more effective early immune response to COVID-19 because of the many other infections people face. We just dont know the reasons for this but it is a very intriguing question, says immunologist Barry Bloom, former dean of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Although she could live and practice medicine anywhere, Deschamps insists shell never leave Haiti. This is my place, she says. Haitians are resilient, she says, in spite of all theyve endured. Its not that we forget [but] we are always looking for the light.
Dr. Sean O'Leary, vice-chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases, told CNN's Anderson Cooper on Monday that coronavirus cases in children should be taken seriously.
"It's not fair to say that this virus is completely benign in children," said O'Leary. "We've had 90 deaths in children in the US already, in just a few months. Every year we worry about influenza in children, and there are roughly around 100 deaths in children from influenza every year."
Leary said that multiple factors have led to a recent increase in the number of coronavirus infections in children in the past couple of weeks, including increased testing, increased movement among children and a rise in infection among the general population.
"When you see a lot more infections in the general population, you're going to see a lot more infections in children," said O'Leary.
"We all have to take this virus seriously, including taking care of our children," said O'Leary.
Deaths still rare
The new report uses case numbers provided by state health departments of 49 states, New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam.
There were 179,990 new Covid-19 cases among US children between July 9 and August 6, according to the report. At least 380,174 total child Covid-19 cases have been reported as of August 6.
As of now, it still appears that severe symptoms are rare among children with Covid-19 infections. Children were between 0.5% and 5.3% of total hospitalizations, according to data from the states that record that information. Children were 0% to 0.4% of all Covid-19 deaths.
Nineteen states have reported no child deaths. In states that tracked the details, 0% to 0.5% of all child Covid-19 cases resulted in death. However, experts worry those numbers may increase as cases in children rise and more children with autoimmune disorders and other risk facts are impacted.
"As case counts rise across the board, that is likely to impact more children with severe illness as well," O'Leary said in a news release from the AAP.
The AAP called for an effective testing strategy so that communities can make the right choice about opening schools.
"In areas with rapid community spread, it's likely that more children will also be infected, and these data show that ... It is up to us to make the difference, community by community," AAP President Dr. Sally Goza said in the news release.
"To protect everyone in our communities -- children, teens, and older adults -- we must follow all the public health measures that we know can contain the virus. This includes physical distancing, wearing cloth face coverings, washing our hands, and avoiding large gatherings," O'Leary said.
Children easily spread virus
"Children ages zero to five can be "highly infectious to other people. It turns out they have a thousand times more virus in their nose than you need to infect, so they're very, very contagious," said William Haseltine, a former professor at Harvard Medical School during an interview Monday on CNN.
"There's every reason to suspect that this virus, even though it can kill you, behaves pretty much like a cold virus, in terms of transmission. Who drives colds? Children drive colds," said Haseltine, known for his groundbreaking work on HIV/AIDS and the human genome.
"And that's true of almost all respiratory diseases, including the colds and including the colds that are caused by coronaviruses. And this is one of those cousins," Haseltine added. "It even uses the same receptor in the nasal passages as one of the cold viruses. It just happens to be a cold virus that also kills."
Need for ICU same as adults
The report looked at hospitalization records from 14 states and found 576 Covid-19 cases among children who needed hospitalization from March through July 25.
Although not many children needed care in the hospital, if they were admitted, one in three needed to be treated in the intensive care unit, the CDC team reported. That's the same rate as for adults.
"Children can develop severe COVID-19 illness; during the surveillance period, one in three children were admitted to the ICU. Hispanic and black children had the highest rates of COVID-19--associated hospitalization," the team wrote.
The CDC didn't have complete data on every child, but for the 208 that the CDC was able to do a complete medical chart review, it found 69 were admitted to the ICU and nearly 6% of them needed to be put on a ventilator. One of those children died.
Children age 2 and younger were the most likely to be hospitalized. Hispanic and Black children were more likely to be hospitalized than White children. More than 40% had one or more underlying condition. Obesity was the most common underlying condition, followed by chronic lung disease.
While Covid-19 symptoms tend to be mild in children, they can spread the disease. To slow the pandemic, the CDC said children should be encouraged to wash their hands often, keep a good physical distance away from others, and if they are 2 years of age or older, they should wear a mask when they are around people outside of their family members.
The U.S. logged the highest number of COVID-19 deaths in two weeks, a new NBC News tally showed Thursday, but widespread testing shortages raised concerns that the figures coming out of the hardest-hit states might not be presenting a true picture of this deadly pandemic.
The 1,424 fatalities reported Wednesday were the highest since July 28, when 2,218 deaths were reported, the figures showed. And it was the twelfth time in the last 16 days that the death toll exceeded 1,000.
Most of these deaths were in the Southern and Sun Belt states like Florida, Texas and Arizona that began reopening in May and June at the urging of President Donald Trump despite warnings from public health experts that the coronavirus was starting to crest.
"The deaths we see today are a result of infections from four to eight weeks ago," Admiral Brett Giroir, the assistant secretary of health and the Trump administration's testing coordinator, said Thursday on a call with reporters.
"Mortality is a lagging indicator," Giroir added. "I don't mean to minimize people who died, but mortality is a lagging indicator and it's going to be a week or two before we see that go down in a meaningful way."
The numbing new numbers came on the same day a sliver of hope emerged that the economy might be starting to mend from the biggest collapse since the Great Depression for the first time in almost five months, the weekly initial job claims fell below one million.
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Theres no question that the breakout of the hot spots in the South and West probably slowed the recovery, Larry Kudlow, the director of the National Economic Council, said on CNBC.
Nevertheless, Kudlow said, the new 963,000 jobless claim figure was a good sign.
Experts, however, said it was difficult to gauge the progress of the pandemic because fewer people are getting tested and some states have been slow to report test results.
I really have come to believe that we have entered a real, new, emerging crisis with testing, and it is making it hard to know where the pandemic in slowing down and where its not, Dr. Ashish Jha, director of the Harvard Health Institute, told CNBC on Wednesday.
Giroir, however, insisted that the number of new COVID-19 cases is decreasing and the rate of hospitalizations is also going down. He said the administration expects to have the capacity to do nearly 90 million tests per month by September, but they probably won't need to do that many tests.
"It's just a false narrative that we need millions of tests," the admiral said. "You need strategic testing implemented with smart policy. That is the plan, that plan is being implemented, and that plan is working."
Trump has been pushing hard to get kids back into the classroom. Weve got to open up our schools and open our businesses, the president said at a White House news conference on Wednesday.
But public health experts have warned that reopening the schools without adequate testing and at a time when too many people are failing to wear masks or practice social distancing could add jet fuel to the pandemic.
And new data is showing a startling surge in children and teenagers diagnosed with COVID-19, NBC News reported Thursday.
"The pediatric cases are in all of the same states that we know are surging with adults who have disease," said Dr. Jodie Dionne-Odom, an assistant professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
As of Thursday morning, the U.S. has reported more than 167,000 deaths due to COVID-19 and more than 5.2 million confirmed infection. The U.S. has accounted for a fourth of the worlds more than 20.7 million cases and 750,429 deaths.
People in New York died of COVID-19 at the start of the pandemic at about the same rate they did from the Spanish Flu back in 1918, according to a new study published in JAMA Network Open. Researchers focused on two 61-day periods: March 11 though May 11 this year and the 61 days of October and November 1918, when the influenza outbreak was at its peak.The study found that during the peak of the 1918 pandemic, 287 per 100,000 New Yorkers died per month, while for this year's pandemic, 202 per 100,000 New Yorkers died per month. The Spanish Flu, which got its nickname when King Alfonse XIII of Spain contracted it and survived, wound up killing an estimated 50 million worldwide and 675,000 in the U.S. alone. New York has, since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, been able to flatten the curve.
The pandemic is believed to have spread around the world from Wuhan, China. But now Chinese officials fear the virus may be returning to their country via frozen food shipments from countries like Brazil and Ecuador where the plague is raging. Inspectors in three Chinese cities have reported detecting COVID-19 on imported frozen food over the span of four days.
Corky Siemaszko is a senior writer for NBC News Digital.
Joe Murphy and Nigel Chiwaya contributed.
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) He was a Twin Cities man known as a quick learner who could do everything from tile a floor to create machinery at General Mills.
John Weilandbecame Minnesotas 221st person to die from COVID-19 when he passed away in April. In our Faces of COVID series, Liz Collin shares a more than half-century love story that starts with two teenagers.
It was just a perfect match. A perfect match, Carol Weiland said.
Back then Carol Weiland was 14 and John 15 when a friend decided they should meet while attending different schools in Minneapolis.
Just a doll, Carol Weiland explained. Extremely handsome. The guys loved him as much as the girls did.
John signed up to serve in the Navy as a teenager alongside his twin brother. He came back to work for General Mills for the next 33 years making the machinery for the products the company would put on the test market.
He could do everything, Carol Weiland said. I mean everything.
From a long-time hockey referee to a fisherman. But, its Johns selflessness that still resonates.
This crash woke us up, Carol Weiland explained.
On full display 20 years ago when he happened to wake up when a snowmobiler fell through an icy Lake Minnetonka in the middle of the night.
John sprang into action and lassoed him up safety.
He saved his life absolutely, Carol Weiland said.
Carol and John enjoyed many retired years together. Until, dementia set in a few years ago.
After keeping her husband at home as long as she could, Carol decided hed be safer at St. Therese in New Hope.
They took good care of him until this virus came, Carol Weiland said.
John was tested repeatedly for COVID-19 this spring. On the third round, he tested positive. He died six days later on April 24 at the age of 80.
I still feel very married, Carol Weiland explained. This whole til death do us part isnt working for me.
Carol believes John sent her a sign when she spotted some pennies near her typical parking spot a few weeks ago.
Three were brand new from 2020.
That fourth penny cleaned up to be 1964 when we got married, Carol Weiland said.
Her pennies from heaven that she says proves shell be reunited someday with her perfect match.
Saint Therese in New Hope has been hard hit by COVID-19 with nearly 70 deaths on the site since March.
michael barbaro
From The New York Times, Im Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily.
So far, the debate over school reopenings has been dominated by a president who is determined to send students back into classrooms
We want to reopen the schools. Everybody wants it. The moms want it. The dads want it. The kids want it. Its time to do it.
and by local school officials, who are answering that call.
So were very much going to put pressure on governors and everybody else to open the schools.
Today: My colleague Dana Goldstein on why teachers and their unions are defying those plans.
Its Thursday, August 13.
Good evening. I stand here tonight not only as governor of Florida, but as a husband, a father, a son and a friend to have a conversation about how we as Floridians approach these challenging times. As a parent of three, I know that my fellow parents here in Florida want nothing more than to provide a bright future for their children. And heres the hard truth. While the risks to students from in-person learning are low, the cost of keeping schools closed are enormous.
Dana, tell me about this situation with schools in Florida.
In early July, just as the Trump administration from Washington was pushing schools to reopen their physical campuses across the country, Florida was the state that really leaned heavily in that same direction under their Republican Governor Ron DeSantis.
The important thing is that our parents have a meaningful choice when it comes to in-person education. Lets not let fear get the best of us and harm our children in the process.
The state issued this executive order.
The state is announcing its requiring all schools to reopen for in-person classes next month, August.
Telling schools that they had to reopen five days a week.
So that announcement coming today, given where Florida is. Your analysis.
I mean my analysis is that that is insane
And this was shocking to superintendents and school boards. You know, they had spent the months of May, June, into July mostly planning for a hybrid model of education. Kids would go to school two or three, or maybe even just one day a week in person, and be home learning online the rest of the time. School districts all of a sudden were being told you have to offer parents and families the option of five days a week in the building.
So we are not ready to open schools in four weeks. We need to slow down and take a pause and get this right around the state first.
And what would happen if schools didnt physically reopen five days a week?
You know, I think the kind of underlying threat was that you would lose state dollars if you dont provide families with this option for in-person learning. And this threat to them was quite scary. Because state funding for education is the main funding that funds our school system in the United States.
And what was the state of the pandemic when the state of Florida makes this demand?
So these numbers were so shocking to us when we did reporting on this that we actually fact checked them many, many times to make sure they were correct.
Florida shattering its daily record, recording more than 15,000 cases, accounting for a quarter of the total new daily cases in the United States.
In some south Florida counties in the month of July
South Floridas Miami-Dade has seen a staggering daily positivity rate of 33 percent.
between 20 and 30 percent of coronavirus tests were coming back positive. And the World Health Organization, the state of California, the state of New York have tended to use a range of about 5 percent to 10 percent test positivity rates as something to look at when deciding whether or not to open schools. So here you might see, you know, four times that number in a city like Miami.
Here in Miami-Dade, according to county data released yesterday, the goal for the county is not to exceed 10 percent. They have exceeded that for the past 14 days.
A strong indication that the virus is completely unchecked in that region. In fact, it was one of the most dangerous cities for the virus in the United States.
Right. So what was the reaction across Florida to this executive order?
Anger.
If the governor wants to open schools publicly, how about we invite him to come and teach in the classroom? [CHEERING]
A lot of teachers and educators were angry.
If he wants to open schools, how about he provide teachers with hazard pay? Because thats exactly what youre doing. Youre on the frontlines of a pandemic that you didnt start, you didnt call for and we dont have control for. [CHEERING]
Because they felt that their safety and, in some respects, safety of the entire community from a public health perspective was nowhere in this conversation.
I teach my students the history of America, how this government has run, how it works. This is a democracy. Our voices need to be heard.
And my inbox and social media were filled with messages from teachers.
So I want everyone to hear my voice that if I die from catching Covid-19 from being forced back into Pinellas County Schools, you can drop my dead body right here! Leave my body right here! [CHEERING]
And it was just this sense that the question of whether we should go back did not pay enough attention to teachers health risks.
Do you feel ready to return to your classroom?
I do not. I personally have lost sleep over it. Ive cried over it. I cry over it a lot. Its very, very scary. And the one thing Im going to say, I will say online learning is not ideal. But it will keep our children safe.
Im a teacher. Ive been with Duval County for 23 years. I have a mother at home that is sick. And if I am to get the coronavirus, I dont want to bring it back to her.
Yes, its really important that kids get educated. Its really important that parents be able to work during the day and children have the basic childcare that schools provide. However
We teachers love our students. And we agree that the best place for students is in school. But thats only if theyre safe. If going to school is more dangerous for students or for their families, then we should hold off and do some sort of distance learning or a hybrid model until its safe for them.
I think theres no way to social distance in our already crowded classrooms. There is not enough money to provide for the extra staff that we would need and the extra P.P.E. that we would need. I dont think that its worth the risk.
We are used to going into schools that sometimes dont have soap in the bathrooms, that sometimes have broken windows that prevent us from circulating fresh air, that have dated heating and ventilation systems. And where is our health in this equation?
This is not how I want to go back. And I want to go back so bad. Because I love teaching. I miss my classroom. I miss my kids.
So what did teachers in Florida do?
The largest teachers union in Florida is suing the state over its executive order mandating that schools reopen next month with in-person instruction.
So a bunch of the local and national union groups that represent teachers came together and they sued the state of Florida.
In the lawsuit, the union says the state is unconstitutionally forcing millions of students and teachers into unsafe schools.
Saying that this executive order requiring schools to reopen five days a week in person actually violated Floridas own state law that also calls for schools to be safe.
The suit says children are at risk of contracting and spreading the virus and of developing severe illness, resulting in death. And the state mandate to open schools is impossible to comply with C.D.C. guidelines on physical distancing, hygiene and sanitation if schools are operating at full capacity.
Its really very simple what they were arguing, that going back five days a week is not safe and therefore, cannot be legal.
Huh. I have to think that its a pretty unusual act, you know, teachers suing to stop their own schools from reopening.
Yes. Its definitely unusual and notable. And interestingly, it paved the way for similar threats to sue across the country, including in northern cities like Chicago and New York. And shortly after this Florida suit came down
The American Federation of Teachers has told its 1.7 million members that if they choose to strike, the union will have their back.
The American Federation of Teachers, which is one of the two national unions, authorized any of their locals across the country to plan a strike in the event that safety precautions are not being met to reopen schools.
Wow. So a national teachers union is saying, a grounds for striking which traditionally weve always thought of as wages, health care, those kinds of issues theyre now saying you may decide to strike over unsafe school conditions in the middle of this pandemic?
Exactly. The threat to strike is very powerful and pragmatic. Because once teachers threaten to strike over the safety measures and questions of funding, it really puts pressure on the local school districts to give them a big seat at the table. And just the core decision, which is, are we even going to try to have in-person school this fall?
Well be right back.
So Dana, as teachers are seeking a place at the table and threatening to strike if they dont feel like schools are safe, what exactly are they asking for in order to feel ready to return to the classroom?
Were seeing a very broad range of demands from teachers. And it runs the spectrum from very specific and achievable requests, to ones that are hugely ambitious, time consuming, expensive, or maybe even impossible to achieve while were still experiencing any transmission of Covid-19.
What do you mean?
So for example in Orlando, when I spoke to teachers there in July, the requests were really quite reasonable. They wanted face masks to be required. They wanted temperature checks in all school district buildings. And then, the American Federation of Teachers, the national union that authorized strikes, had a very specific set of demands that they were looking for nationally. They wanted to see test positivity rates for the virus below 5 percent, transmission rates below 1 percent, effective contact tracing for the entire region, the school to require masks, update ventilation systems, and put in place procedures to maintain six feet of distance.
Wow.
So very much sort of in line with C.D.C. guidelines for being as safe as possible.
So the union is making demands of an entire community, and level of infection and transmission and contact tracing beyond the school?
Exactly. Theyre expecting those things to work in the whole region before you sort of even get to the question of what sort of P.P.E. is available to teachers or something like that.
What about less practical requests from teachers?
So there you see this big movement bubbling up on social media under the hashtag #14daysnonewcases. And this is really quite a radical demand for schools not to reopen physically until there are no new cases in a region for 14 days. Now many nations have been able to reopen their schools safely without achieving that standard. And when Ive spoken to public health experts about this, what they say is, you know, 14 days no new cases is not just a controlled pandemic, its essentially the end of the pandemic in that region. And it might require a vaccine to get to that standard. Not just a vaccine that exists and works, but that has actually been deployed widely. When will that occur? Will that occur six months from now, 12 months from now, two years from now? We just dont know the answer to that. And those start to be very big numbers when youre thinking about children being out of school.
I wonder what these demands from teachers look like to parents in this moment. I mean, Im mindful that many parents want their kids to return to school for a variety of very understandable reasons.
Thats right. I mean, I think the really hard thing is that there is no consensus or even strong majority opinion among parents. One recent national poll found about 60 percent of parents at this moment believe its smarter to delay reopening physical schools until the virus subsides somewhat and there are more safety measures in place. But in some big cities, where the virus has been relatively well-controlled, like New York and Chicago, polls have found that a majority of families do have some willingness to send their kids back to school.
And to add another layer of complication, it tends to be parents of color and low income parents that are the most scared of the health threats to their children of congregating in school buildings. But those families are also the most concerned about their kids falling back socially and academically because schools are closed. So there is just no consensus among parents as to what they feel is safe. It would in some ways be easier if American parents all agreed with each other about what was right here.
Mhm. And of course in the absence of physically returning to schools, were left with online learning. And we have covered on the show the problems with how teachers and school districts are approaching that.
Yeah. So in the spring, only a small segment of American school districts actually required teachers to teach live lessons over something like Zoom video. And here I think there is actually more risk of tension between parents and teachers. Because were starting to see from polls what parents are asking for in a situation of continued remote learning.
They were not happy that in the spring, many of their kids did not see teachers live over video. Many teachers were interacting with their students primarily over email at sort of random times per day. And thats not what parents want.
They want their students to log on at very specific times and be in something like an online class, where they would have small group breakout sessions and discussions and have the opportunity to ask the teacher questions and get individualized feedback. And teachers unions are still, in some cases, resisting some of these practices, including even showing their faces on live video.
And Dana, why would that be? I guess Im confused. If teachers are deeply reluctant to return to schools for very understandable reasons that you just outlined, and they dont feel school districts are meeting them halfway, why would they simultaneously be resisting a more enriched online remote teaching experience?
Well, some of them make the argument that its not fair to provide too much live instruction, because students who dont have an adult to supervise their online learning at home, say, at exactly 10:00 a.m., might just miss out on the live lesson. So they think that that mode of education is not effective.
But Ive also heard some arguments much simpler than that, that they dont want their homes to be shown. Theyre not comfortable in that medium. And they believe its a violation of their own privacy to be shown from home in that way. So its a range of different arguments there.
That would seem to raise a real crisis. I mean, teachers both not wanting to be in classrooms, but also not wanting to teach online the way parents want them to.
Well, this has been the sort of crux of these very tense latest negotiations across the country between teachers and school district leaders.
Dana, I know a bunch of school districts around the country have actually started classes in schools. And I wonder how that has played out.
Well, there have been some horror stories, unfortunately.
In Georgia, this photo of a crowded hallway, no mask in sight, from North Paulding High School went viral after the school opened for in-person learning on August 3.
You know, for one of the first school districts to reopen, which was in Georgia, hundreds of staff were told to stay home because of potential exposure to the virus.
Today the school remain closed, a week after that reopening.
In Indiana
One student at Greenfield Central Junior High tested positive on the very first day of school.
right away this junior high school was having to call teachers and call students families and ask them to stay home for two weeks.
Students at Elwood Junior Senior High now have to go remote after staff members there tested positive for Covid-19.
Now thats extremely alarming. But I want to say that nobody whos a public health or education expert believes that were going to reopen schools without students and teachers showing up from time to time positive for Covid-19. Thats not a realistic expectation.
But what we do need is procedures in place to deal with that when it happens. I mean, it needs to be clear who is getting told to stay home for two weeks. And, is their access to testing for anyone who came in contact with that positive individual? So in many ways, I think these anecdotes that were hearing of kind of first-day-back crises in towns and cities that are trying to reopen physically do show that many of the concerns that teachers have brought to the table here are quite legitimate.
So those are a small number of districts that have already reopened. But of course, many of the nations largest school districts Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., among others, are now firmly saying that they will not physically reopen schools at least initially. And that represents millions of students. So do teachers unions and teachers see that as a kind of victory?
They do see it as a victory, absolutely. They believe that its not only whats necessary to protect their health but to prevent schools emerging as potential hot spots for spreading Covid-19.
But I think within that victory, there is also a real tragedy for American children and actually for our country.
Because to be in a place where the needs of public health and safety are really juxtaposed against our ability to fully educate our kids, is to be in a place that very few other developed nations are in right now. And it is because of our failure to control the pandemic itself. We are looking at the real likelihood that millions or tens of millions of children do not attend school for an entire year. A full year of no school.
And we just know that its going to lead to big problems. Its going to make kids less likely to learn to read. Its going to probably lead to higher high school dropout rates. Its going to lead to students who dont have enough to eat, because school is where they are fed. And to students that dont have access to the mental health counseling and the special education services that they get at schools.
So the fact that were having to choose between everything crucial that the physical school provides and public health, its stunning. Its stunning to me as a 15-year veteran on the education beat and just also as a parent. You know, my daughter is going to come through this pandemic just fine. She has access to a great childcare and we have a lot of resources in our home and family to bring her through this.
NAPLES
A nationally renowned doctor who worked on the chickenpox vaccine gave NCH a glimpse into what a vaccine for COVID-19 could look like, including the safety concerns.
The international push for a vaccine has turned research into a race.
It will be at least six months from today before we have a licensed vaccine. And that is if everything goes right and there are no barriers unless we trade safety for speed, said Dr. Gregory Poland with the Vaccine Research Group at Mayo Clinic.
Polands specialty is vaccine research.
Were going to try something that has never before been done in modern human history and that is compress this to 12 months, he told doctors at NCH in Naples.
Poland said one concern with rushed research is a vaccine can actually make the infection worse, which happened with dengue.
People who were immunized and then infected with the wild virus actually developed worse disease than the people who are never immunized, he said.
Another concern is several vaccines hitting the market at once, allowing people to mix and match their doses as newer and more effective vaccines start rolling out.
There are actually now over 200 coronavirus vaccines in development, Poland said. Nobody is studying the interchangeability of these vaccines.
Thats why Poland said physicians need to speak up and balance that message.
You and I as physicians need to be reasoned voices educating, directing, and nudging the public.
Poland thinks January will be the earliest we may see a vaccine, and it will come with its share of issues.
Another blind spot of a potential vaccine is theyre not being tested in children or pregnant women.
The West Virginia Department of Health andHuman Resources (DHHR) reports as of 10:00 a.m., on August 11,2020, there have been 330,447 total confirmatorylaboratory results received for COVID-19, with 7,875 totalcases and 147 deaths.
DHHR has confirmed the deaths of a72-year old female from Logan County, a 71-year old female from Wyoming County,an 89-year old female from Mercer County, an 82-year old female from MercerCounty, an 89-year old female from Grant County, and an 83-year old female fromGrant County. Asthis pandemic continues, it doesnt get any easier to report the deaths of ourresidents. Our sincere condolences are extended to these families, said BillJ. Crouch, Cabinet Secretary of DHHR.
In alignment with updated definitions fromthe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the dashboard includes probablecases which are individuals that have symptoms and either serologic (antibody)or epidemiologic (e.g., a link to a confirmed case) evidence of disease, but noconfirmatory test.
CASESPER COUNTY (Case confirmed by lab test/Probable case):Barbour (29/0), Berkeley (672/27), Boone(105/0), Braxton (8/0), Brooke (66/1), Cabell (399/10), Calhoun (6/0), Clay(18/0), Doddridge (6/0), Fayette (153/1), Gilmer (17/0), Grant (120/1),Greenbrier (93/0), Hampshire (76/0), Hancock (108/4), Hardy (60/1), Harrison(229/3), Jackson (165/0), Jefferson (289/7), Kanawha (947/13), Lewis (27/1),Lincoln (94/0), Logan (246/0), Marion (188/4), Marshall (126/4), Mason (63/0),McDowell (60/1), Mercer (203/0), Mineral (123/2), Mingo (180/2), Monongalia(933/17), Monroe (20/1), Morgan (29/1), Nicholas (36/1), Ohio (269/3),Pendleton (41/1), Pleasants (13/1), Pocahontas (41/1), Preston (104/21), Putnam(199/1), Raleigh (251/8), Randolph (206/5), Ritchie (3/0), Roane (16/0),Summers (14/0), Taylor (58/1), Tucker (10/0), Tyler (15/0), Upshur (37/3),Wayne (210/2), Webster (4/0), Wetzel (43/1), Wirt (7/0), Wood (244/12), Wyoming(34/0).
Ascase surveillance continues at the local health department level, it may revealthat those tested in a certain county may not be a resident of that county, oreven the state as an individual in question may have crossed the state borderto be tested. Such is the case of Lewis and McDowellcounties in this report.
Pleasenote that delays may be experienced with the reporting of information from thelocal health department to DHHR. Visitthe dashboard at www.coronavirus.wv.gov for more detailed information.
On July 24,2020, Gov. Jim Justice announced that DHHR, the agency in charge of reportingthe number of COVID-19 cases will transition from providing twice-daily updatesto one report every 24 hours. This becameeffective August 1, 2020.
On the August episode of the Connect with County Leaders Podcast, Fairfax County Executive Bryan Hill shares updates on the ongoing COVID-19 situation in Fairfax County, which is still in Phase 3 of the Commonwealths Forward Virginia plan, as well as support for the school system and school-age children, Census 2020 and more.
Hill also had specific messages for county residents, the business community and county employees. One of his messages to everyone was to stay healthy and to stay rested and recharged, both mentally and physically.
What Im seeing is a lot of folks that are working very, very hard, diligently working and are getting very tired. So please take some vacation time for the folks that have not been able to. We need people that are rested, and this COVID coronavirus pandemic has not allowed us to rest and recharge batteries. So, Im hopeful that everybody is taking a mental health break, a physical health break, as well taking some time out with their families.
The county executive added that the Fairfax County Government is here to help serve and protect all residents of Fairfax County, and that the Board of Supervisors and the great staff of Fairfax County are indebted to you all [residents] during this time.
If you need us, we are here. We are going to do the best service that we can possibly do during these hard times. So, if you need us, please, please, please give us a call or come into DTA or whatever you can do. But if you can do it from a distance, thats even better, because obviously we have not gotten to a vaccine for COVID-19. But again, were here to serve. And were here to protect and thats what our job and our focus and our mission is.
Coronavirus Update with County Executive Bryan Hill Connect with County Leaders (Aug. 2020)
Were going to continue doing telework provisions. You have to work with your supervisors and your directors, and how we could work from home or if you come back into the office. You can have flex schedules. My goal is certainly to ensure that we continue providing the service but give you the flexibility and if we can, continue to move forward the way we are. Were in a good place because were able to move and adapt. But if its a set schedule, you have to be here at eight oclock and you have to stay until five, I know thats impossible during this pandemic. And if supervisors are saying mandating it, that is something that we cant do. Obviously, we do have public safety and some in public works that have shiftwork. So, I have to work around that a little bit. But for the most part, if youre able to telecommute, and you have childcare concerns, Im leaving it up to you to work with your supervisor to see how you can make this work.
We have seen some hours increase in the Department of Tax Administration and Land Development Services. But we havent seen many changes. Again, our goal was to continuously provide services to our community, our residents, and to ensure our staff continue to have a workplace thats safe. Those changes have happened. We have a safer workplace. We have increased the amount of PPE throughout our county at our buildings, as well as putting up face coverings and guards around the county operations, the key physical and social distancing, and were doing it per CDC guidelines as well as per Health Department guidelines.
Its all predicated on numbers and federal funding and being able to provide a community with what they deserve. And if our population is 1 million, and we only have 500,000 people responding, we then lose out on a lot of federal funding. Luckily for us, if our population is 1 million, which it is not, its 1.2 million, but Im doing this for easy math, and you said 77%, so the way I look at life, were 230,000 away from being 100%. So thats 23 cents off of $1. And ironically, thats about what we get from the state when we send $1 down to Richmond. So, lets bump this up a bit. We still can do it online; we can do it by paper. We have people coming to knock on doors. So. lets bump it up. If you know people that havent done the census, tell them lets do it.
If youre tired, please take a vacation. Go away somewhere. And when I say go away somewhere thats probably retreating back to your house and put down the tablet and whatever. But know that I really appreciate all the hard work youve been putting out. From top to bottom, weve done a bang up job thus far. But you know, the end is not near, but it is insight. Hopefully well have a vaccine at some point so we can get back to somewhat normal. But as I say, just continuously wash your hands, keep social distancing, physical distancing, wear your face guards, be healthy, go out and work out because those are things that can keep your mental health in a good place.
Listen to past episodes of Connect with County Leaders. For other Fairfax County podcasts, visitwww.fairfaxcounty.gov/podcasts, and for additional audio content, tune in to Fairfax County Government Radio atwww.fairfaxcounty.gov/radio.
The Connect with County Leaders podcast is a regular opportunity to meet and connect with Fairfax County leaders, to learn about the latest county news and information, and hear more on specific Fairfax County programs and services.
Editors note: 10 On Your Side is not naming the salon in this story because the Virginia Department of Health does not publish names of businesses where coronavirus cases or outbreaks occur. 10 On Your Side reached out to the salon repeatedly for comment, but did not get a response.
NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) Public health officials have repeatedly said contact tracing is a critical part of reopening the economy during the coronavirus pandemic.
Participating in the process, however, isnt mandatory.
Iris Dodsonfound that out firsthandafter a COVID-19 exposure atasalon in Virginia Beachon a Thursday evening in June.
I received a call that following Monday that my hairstylist had tested positive, Dodson said.
By Thursday, she still hadnt gotten a call from a contact tracer, as she had anticipated.
On Thursday, when I hadnt heard from contact tracers, I gave the health department a call, she said. They told me they knew there was a salon where there had been a positive case, but they didnt have the name of the salon or the people to contact.
Dodson was shocked to find out that businesses dont have tocooperate with contact tracers and that her otherwise cautious, mask-wearing stylist hadnt been transparent.
The story didnt surprise Lisa Engle, a Virginia Department of Health epidemiologist with decades of contact tracing experience.
People lie all the time, Engle said. They dont report out of fear. Alot of times its becausethey dont want their work to know or they dont want a business to be jeopardized and be on the news.
But VDH doesnt publicize the names of businesses that have COVID-19 cases or outbreaks, and Engle says its not always necessary to shut those businesses down.
It depends on the situation, she said. Were not going in and saying You need toclose,you need to get all those people out of here. We dont do that. What were trying to do is make sure everybody that was exposed knows, so they can self-monitor and stay home.
Dodson saideven though she didnt get sick and eventually received a negative test result,shes lost trust in the salon,specifically because it didnt cooperate with the health department.
Having the contact with the health department would have given me more guidance and information about the testing facilities and just to know in general what I should be doing, she said. There should be an obligation to the public when you serve the public.
That obligation to the public is exactly why Rick Fraley shut down his two Norfolk restaurants after he was exposed to the coronavirus in July.
Clementines at Riverviewhad just reopened after months of being shut down because of the pandemic, but Fraley said he felt he had no choice but to shut it down afterhe was exposed to COVID-19 during a conversation with a delivery driver.
He reached out to the health department immediately.
They didnt say we had to [shut down], as long as we properly contained it and if we knew exactly who was exposed, Fraleysaid.Were a small staff, we only have six people. We thought the smartest thing to do was just to close outright.
Fraley and his wife also decided to close The Ten Top, where she runs operations.
As they waited for staff to get tested, Fraley kept customers informed on social media.The comments were overwhelmingly positive, praising the restaurants for their transparency.
I feel like we have a good rapport with our community, I think they trust us, Fraley said. I think they know that whenthey come here, they can expect us to be clean and to be safe, and to be following regulations, and its not worth it to lose that sort of community trust that we built up.
Still, Fraley lost hundreds of dollars of food that had to be thrown out, a catering contract and two weeks of income.
Its hard to make a decision like that, he said. The people that arent following the regulations, I think that they should be punished.Honestly, you know if youre going into a place and theyre not making people wear masks, theyre not following social distancing, I think thats wrong.
Regardless of what othersdo or dont do, Fraley said serving his community as a small businessownermatters too much for him to have made any other decision than to shut down.
I want to protect it at any cost and make sure theres nothing that Im going to do, especially if its socially irresponsible, to cost myself that opportunity.
