As many school districts debate how and when to reopen schools, one Bay Area county is at the head of the class.
“Almost 90% of our schools in Marin County have been opened to classroom based learning since starting on September 8th, when we started reopening,” said Dr. Matt Willis, the county’s public health officer.
In all that time, the county has only traced 11 cases of transmission back to the schools.
“And none of those were from a student to an adult. They were either between staff members as adults or between students,” said Dr. Willis.
Public health experts have consistently shown that children are far less susceptible to the coronavirus, but there are still serious concerns that children could spread the virus to their teachers.
In Marin County at least, there have been no documented cases of that type of transmission.
Dr. Willis says the county has been working on its reopening plan since they closed schools in March.
“(We) developed with the schools very specific, school site specific protection plans that outlined all the measures, 30 different elements of safe reopening. And they stuck to those.”
Every school has a safety liaison who works directly with the public health department as issues arise.
“With that structure, we’re able to actually offer more protection, we think, to students and the community as a whole.”
Dr. Willis argues that reopening schools in this manner may actually be safer for children than having less structured lives outside of school.
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