Free COVID testing at schools in state off to a slow start
How many Connecticut students are being regularly tested for COVID-19?
An exact number is hard to pin down, as the stateoffered testing program is off to a slow start.
Less than a quarter of public school districts have signed on with the state for free COVID testing and the number of families that have enrolled to have their children tested in those municipalities is not publicly available.
The Connecticut Department of Public Health reported on Friday that 22.5 percent of public school districts have expressed interest in the state’s free school testing initiative, Project COVID DeteCT.
The program is voluntary and parents must consent to the tests, meaning not all students in participating districts will be tested. The state did not have figures on how many families have opted in.
“We do not have consent numbers at this time because that is an ongoing enrollment process,” said Christopher Boyle, spokesperson for the health department.
Project COVID DeteCT is funded by federal dollars to supply schools with weekly pooled COVID-19 tests. The initiative targets younger children ineligible for the vaccine, though grades 7 through 12 were considered in some districts.
The program “keeps schools safe by catching cases before they spread to other students and other staff,” Boyle previously told Hearst Connecticut Media.
The state tracks COVID-19 cases in schools, but without widespread testing in a majority of districts, the dashboard could be missing positive test results. Even some school districts that have opted in haven’t begun testing yet.
During the week from Sept. 30 through Oct. 6, the most recent time frame for which data is available, 506 students reported positive cases, according to the state’s database. Less than 9 percent of those included were vaccinated — the rest were unvaccinated or did not report vaccine status.
The latest state public health department data shows 69 percent of children ages 12 to 15, and 79 percent of children 16 to 17, have received at least one dose of the vaccine.
The number of childhood cases is significantly down from its peak this school year, when 877 students were positive during the week of Sept. 9 through 15.
This month, Pfizer asked the U.S. government to authorize its COVID-19 vaccine for kids ages 5 to 11. Still, testing could remain important as Connecticut reckons with vaccine hesitancy and children wait five weeks from the first dose for full protection.
Dr. John Schreiber, the interim chief of infectious diseases at Connecticut Children’s Medical Center and a pediatrics professor at UConn’s School of Medicine, attributed low program participation to the current stage of the pandemic.
“The bigger picture is looking good, and I sense some fatigue,” Schreiber said. “When the vaccine comes out, I want to focus my efforts on getting as many children immunized as possible.”
Project COVID DeteCT is free to schools and completely voluntary, leading some districts such as Greenwich, Norwalk and Danbury to sign onto the service, while many others opted out.
“The short answer: We are not testing students or staff in schools,” said Trumbull Superintendent Martin Semmel. “There are many testing locations available to students and staff, and they are using those locations.”
Some districts have opted into the program but not begun testing — more than a month into the school year.
“We have not started weekly COVID testing yet, so no numbers yet. We are still working with our testing partner to get set up,” said Andrea Clark, communications director at Fairfield Public Schools, last week.
Participating districts were assigned regional vendors to administer shallow nasal swab tests at school-based sites. Progressive Diagnostics is overseeing testing programs in Bridgeport, Darien, Fairfield, Greenwich, Norwalk, Stamford and Westport. Quest Diagnostics are administering others throughout the state, such as New Britain, Ridgefield and New Haven.
The latter city began testing through the free program on Monday, according to a letter sent to families.
“The COVID-19 test is quick, easy and it does not hurt,” wrote Paul Whyte, the assistant superintendent of instructional leadership.
“We strongly encourage your student to participate to help us reduce the spread of the COVID-19 disease,” he added.
School districts can also work with non-state-provided testing partners.
Unvaccinated students attending private schools in kindergarten through sixth grade in Bridgeport, Danbury, Hartford, New Britain, New Haven, Norwalk, Stamford or Waterbury were also eligible for the program.
Dr. Thomas Murray, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, encouraged people to think of COVID testing as one mitigation strategy in a series of several. For as long as a small group of children are opting in, the approach will not be as effective as masking, for example.
“If doing swabs once in a while can help kids get back to a regular school day, and eventually down the road get rid of masks and allow them to engage in more social activities,” Murray said, “that’s where we need to head, because COVID is going to be with us at some level for the foreseeable future.”