Tag: reopening

Reopening elementary schools carries less COVID-19 risk than high schools – but that doesn’t guarantee safety
LIFESTYLE

Reopening elementary schools carries less COVID-19 risk than high schools – but that doesn’t guarantee safety

While only a fraction of the country’s 50 million public school kids headed back to school in-person this month, many have already found themselves back at home. Within two weeks of opening, multiple states reported school-based COVID-19 outbreaks, and thousands of students and school staff have been quarantined following possible exposure to SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. Many of these districts are in areas with high community spread of COVID-19, and some didn’t enforce social distancing or require face masks. Our team of infectious disease epidemiologists collected data in the San Francisco Bay Area and ran computer simulations to examine how school closures and reopenings can affect the spread of COVID-19. What we learned points to three key strategies for minimi...
Why safely reopening high school sports is going to be a lot harder than opening college and pro ball
IN OTHER NEWS, SPORTS

Why safely reopening high school sports is going to be a lot harder than opening college and pro ball

Along with the revival of professional sports comes the yearning for a return to amateur sports – high school, college and club. Governing officials are now offering guidance as to when and how to resume play. However, lost in the current conversation is how schools and club sports with limited resources can safely reopen. As an exercise scientist who studies athlete health and an emergency medicine physician who leads Michigan’s COVID-19 mobile testing unit, we wish to empower athletes, coaches and parents by sharing information related to the risks of returning to play without COVID-19 testing. This includes blood tests to see if athletes have already had COVID-19 plus nasal swabs to test for the active SARS-CoV-2 virus. Regular COVID-19 testing on all athletes may seem like overkill, ...