New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
‘Hygiene theater’?
Need for deep cleaning in schools questioned
NEW HAVEN — During the pandemic, the surfaces in New Haven’s schools are kept spotless.
Custodians do their normal rounds during the day — filling soap dispensers, emptying garbage bins and cleaning up after lunch waves — but the nighttime is for deep cleaning.
Deep cleaning of buildings has been a state mandate for reopening school buildings since summer. However, a number of researchers and public health experts have asked whether disinfecting surfaces is a necessary
measure to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
In the medical journal The Lancet, Rutgers New Jersey Medical School microbiology professor Emanuel Goldman argued in July 2020 that the risk of COVID-19 transmission through surfaces is exaggerated. Based on those findings, Derek Thompson, a staff writer for The Atlantic, coined the term “hygiene theater” to describe the response of public and private entities to scrub down surfaces to prevent the spread of a virus believed to be transmitted primarily through the air, either person-toperson or through aerosol droplets that linger in poorly-ventilated spaces.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also supports the position that contact with contaminated surfaces is not a common means of transmission of the virus.
Despite that, Connecticut officials are resolute in mandating school disinfection procedures.
In a joint memo from the state Department of Education and Department of Public Health released March 29, officials announced that state guidance had been revised to allow a minimum of three feet of space between students wearing masks in schools instead of six feet based on new scientific evidence. However, the memo urges the continuation of several other transmission mitigation strategies including regular disinfecting of school buildings.
“Those mitigation strategies have led to the highest rate of in-person learning we have seen all school year,” said state Department of Education spokesman Peter Yazbak. “As of the week of March 22, over 97 percent of districts are operating either fully inperson or hybrid as their predominant school model, and Connecticut is now providing in-person learning to a higher percent of students than Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Washington, D.C., and any other state in New England.”
Yazbak said the memo also urges vigilance in maintaining those mitigation strategies, despite the increase in vaccinations and the warmer weather. According to state data, the rate of virus transmission has been increasing, despite the state leading most of the nation in its rate of vaccinations.
According to a list of tasks provided by the New Haven school district’s facilities director, after each day of school at night and during the day on Wednesdays, high-touch areas receive a deep cleaning — custodians first wipe down areas by hand with soap, detergent or the cleaner Re-Juv-Nal, then spray them with the disinfectant Q.T. developed by Hillyard.
This school year, Wednesdays generally are more unstructured than the other four days in the school week: students receive a heavier emphasis on emotional growth, teachers receive training and development instead of teaching live in front of the classroom, and both stay home while custodians scrub and disinfect the buildings.
On Wednesdays, custodians wipe down and disinfect “high-touch” surfaces primarily in four areas: classrooms, bathrooms, locker rooms and cafeterias. In bathrooms, hightouch areas include doorknobs or handles, light switches and cover plates, paper towel dispenser knobs or handles, faucet handles, toilet and urinal flush levers and toilet and urinal partitions and doors. In classrooms, surfaces include doorknobs and handles, light switches and cover plates, telephones and other commonly touched items such as keyboards, touchscreens, copiers and computer mice.
According to Joseph Barbarotta, the district’s director of facilities, it is common for custodians to split up areas of the buildings to wipe down before another custodian tasked with spraying disinfectant moves through the building. He said custodians also are responsible for filling bottles of cleaning solution for teachers who want the ability to spray and disinfect their own rooms.
Despite the mounting scientific evidence that contaminated surfaces are not a common means of transmission, Karl Minges, chairman of health administration and policy for the University of New Haven, said he believes it’s worthwhile to continue disinfecting schools out of an abundance of caution.
“What are kids doing, especially young kids? They’re touching their faces all the time,” he said. “The opportunity for a transmission of the particles is there for kids that are in an educational setting.”
Minges said that if schools are engaging in “hygiene theater” then theater may not be a bad thing if it communicates to the community the importance of taking precautions concerning the virus.
“I don’t think it hurts to disinfect surfaces that are high-touch points; anything to avoid a third wave here in Connecticut,” he said.
Dave Cicarella, president of the New Haven Federation of Teachers, said he believes it is in the best interests of staff and students to continue doing deep cleaning of buildings. Even if the CDC has said the virus is not frequently transmitted through contact with surfaces, he said the organization has not recommended against disinfecting surfaces, either.
“You want those touch points to be cleaned or wiped down. Until the
CDC says you don’t need to do it anymore, they probably should be doing it,” he said.
Some parents said that, regardless of the effectiveness of disinfecting hightouch areas, there have been upsides.
“I agree that there is a bit of security theater to the deep cleaning,” said Jill Kelly, an expert in morphology at Yale University and the parent of a high school student at Engineering and Science University Magnet School. “That said, it’s hard to be against very clean schools!”
Kelly said that if there is a question about whether the funds for cleaning buildings are being applied wisely, the better bet would be to invest in ventilation. Much of the deep cleaning of school buildings is funded through a multimillion-dollar federal aid grant; district leaders had to apply the money toward protective measures, arguing they could not use the money for facility upgrades.
According to Barbarotta, the expected increase in labor costs by adding more shifts is about $840,000 this year.
Parent Sarah Miller, who has two children at the school temporarily known as Christopher Columbus Family Academy, said she does not know whether disinfecting is necessary, but she appreciates the “Wellness Wednesdays” for her sons.
“Kids need the break from academics amidst all the other stressors,” she said.