6 virus cases reported at 2 schools

Six students in the Chattooga County, Georgia, school district have tested positive for COVID-19.

In a new weekly report compiled by Superintendent Jared Hosmer, it was reported that five students at Chattooga High School and one at Summerville Middle School tested positive for the virus.

In the report, the school district’s plan is laid out to detail how campuses will move forward if the spread of the virus gets worse. Following public health guidelines, the school district will take each school as a separate case and evaluate the

percentage of positive cases for each school’s population, including students and staff.

With five cases reported at Chattooga High, that represents 0.84% of the 597 people at the school.

The local health department will contact trace each positive case. No other information on the cases was available Saturday morning.

If the percentage of positive cases reaches 2%, the school will move to a hybrid program in which students will go to school four days a week starting on Tuesdays. Mondays will be used to clean and sanitize the building.

If the percentage reaches 3%, students will come to school only two days a week (every other day) so only half the student body is at school at one time.

The district will go fully virtual if the percentage of positive cases reaches 4% or higher. At Chattooga High, that would be 24 people.

The Georgia Department of Public Health has the authority to close down any school in the state based on community spread and hospitalization rate.

There have been no cases at Leroy Massey

Elementary, Lyerly Elementary, Menlo Elementary or the district’s administration building, where 145 people work.

The first two cases in the district were announced Tuesday, just four school days after schools reopened. Chattooga County Schools was one of the first districts to reopen schools in the country.

Elsewhere, two employees with Dade County Schools tested positive a week before school is scheduled to open.

Cases in Chattooga County have been slowly climbing over the past two weeks. The state is reporting there have been 118 confirmed cases in the past two weeks, which is nearly half of the county’s 241 cases reported since midMarch. The county recorded its highest daily total on Aug. 6, with 20 new cases.

The seven-day moving average hit a record high Friday, with 9.6 average new cases per day. A third person died that same day in the county, the first death since April 29.

Hosmer said he will start releasing weekly reports every Friday at 4:30 p.m.