School Outbreaks Test Back-To-School Covid Protocols
Grade schools and universities are not the only ones reporting crowd-driven spikes: Unsurprisingly, South Dakota covid cases are up 5-fold after the Sturgis motorcycle rally. And the Los Angeles Police Department is wrestling an outbreak.
Athens Banner-Herald:
UGA COVID-19 Cases Double After The First Week Of Classes
The University of Georgia has reported its COVID-19 cases for the first week of classes. For the week of Aug. 16-22, UGA reported there have been 231 positive COVID-19 cases submitted through DawgCheck, the campus’s system for tracking cases for students and employees. People on campus are required to report a positive COVID-19 test. The data report states that the data is not “an accurate barometer of the current status of COVID-19 at any point in time at any one of UGA’s campuses," due to delays in reporting and the inclusion of individuals who have recovered or who have not been on campus recently. (Allen, 8/25)
NBC News and AP:
Covid Prompts School District In Texas Town To Quarantine For Two Weeks
A Covid-19 outbreak sweeping through a small West Texas town has shut down businesses and forced staff and students in its school district to quarantine for at least two weeks. Students had returned to classrooms in Iraan, Texas, for only a week when they were told their schools would have to be closed because of a Covid outbreak, said Tracy Canter, superintendent of the Iraan-Sheffield Independent School District, in a letter to the community posted on the district's Facebook page. (Planas, 8/25)
Los Angeles Times:
L.A. Unified Reports First Classroom Coronavirus Outbreak
Los Angeles school officials on Wednesday confirmed the first coronavirus outbreak in the district at Grant Elementary School in Hollywood, sending home an entire classroom of children. “The cases are concentrated in a single classroom and Los Angeles Unified is fully cooperating with the Department of Public Health,” the district said in a statement. “The district has alerted all those potentially impacted and the quarantined class has been provided with instructional materials to continue their studies.” (Blume, 8/25)
In other news about outbreaks —
NBC News:
South Dakota Covid Cases Quintuple After Sturgis Motorcycle Rally
Two weeks after the annual motorcycle rally in Sturgis, South Dakota, reported Covid infections in the state have risen nearly sixfold. South Dakota counted 3,819 new cases in the past two weeks, including seven deaths, up from 644 cases in the 14 days preceding it. That makes it the state with the largest percent increase in Covid cases in the past two weeks. (Kesslen and Murphy, 8/25)
NBC News:
84 Employees Of LAPD Test Positive For Covid, Nearly Doubling Cases In One Week
The Los Angeles Police Department said over 80 of its employees have tested positive for Covid-19 in the past week, nearly doubling its case numbers from the previous week as its vaccination rate hovers below 50 percent. Of the 84 cases, 26 were at the city's Central Division station, NBC Los Angeles reported. The data from the department show that the overall weekly numbers have doubled as the vaccination rate within the police department remains around 47 percent, according to NBC Los Angeles. (Fitzsimons, 8/25)
Axios:
NRA Cancels Annual Meeting Due To COVID-19
The National Rifle Association has canceled its annual meeting in Houston because of concerns about the rising rate of COVID-19 infections in Texas, the organization announced Wednesday. Texas, like much of the U.S., is experiencing a surge in cases driven by the highly-contagious Delta variant. (Saric, 8/25)
KHN:
What Missouri Learned The Hard Way About Rapid Covid Testing In Schools
Early in the tumultuous 2020-21 school year, Missouri officials made a big gamble: set aside roughly 1 million rapid covid tests for the state’s K-12 schools in hopes of quickly identifying sick students or staff members. The Trump administration had spent $760 million to procure 150 million rapid-response antigen tests from Abbott Laboratories, including 1.75 million allotted for Missouri, telling states to use them as they saw fit. Nearly 400 Missouri charter, private and public school districts applied. Given supply constraints, each was offered one test per person, according to interviews with school officials and documents KHN obtained in response to a public records request. What began as an ambitious plan landed with a thud. Few of the tests were used; according to state data updated in early June, schools reported using just 32,300. (Pradhan, 8/26)
