Officials: Parents need to keep sick kids home
A day after rising COVID-19 cases at Summerville High School prompted administrators to send students home for an emergency closure, the Tuolumne County health officer, county Public Health, and the county Office of Emergency Services shared more information Friday about coronavirus concerns at local schools.
Other schools aside from Summerville have challenges with COVID-19 cases, Michelle Jachetta, county Public Health director, said in a conference call. Jachetta cited statistics she shared Thursday with The Union Democrat.
In the past two weeks, there were 517 new COVID-19 cases in Tuolumne County, and 80 of those cases were associated with schools, where protocols prohibit specifying whether school cases involved students or school staff, Jachetta said.
As of Thursday evening, county Public Health has tried to follow up with about 130 known individuals who may have been in contact with positive COVID-19 cases associated with schools, Jachetta said.
Since the recent coronavirus surge began in July, about 10% of contact tracing calls prove fruitless because people don’t answer or respond to texts or phone messages from Tuolumne County Public Health, Jachetta said.
“It’s become more difficult during the surge,” Jachetta said. “People have become less likely to answer the calls.”
There have been 21 confirmed coronavirus deaths counted in Tuolumne County since Aug. 1, Jachetta said. As of Friday afternoon, a total of 93 coronavirus deaths had been counted in Tuolumne County.
The county’s case rates appear to be “starting to plateau,” Jachetta said. The county’s case rate Thursday was 51.3 per 100,000 residents over the previous two weeks. “We’re still really high, well into the purple if we were still on the Blueprint for a Safer Economy.”
Ryan Campbell, the elected county supervisor for District 2, said increasing hospitalizations
and deaths remain a grave concern as current surge statistics begin to flatten out.
Dr. Eric Sergienko, acting health officer for Tuolumne County, said the workload for county Public Health and himself has increased in recent days due to COVID-19 concerns at schools in the county.
“It’s been a challenge,” Sergienko said.
“Bottom line, parents need to be honest and assess their kids and don’t send a sick kid to school. Be mindful of the impacts of sending a sick kid to school.”
Campbell said he’s a parent with three children in public elementary schools in Tuolumne County, and he’s concerned about the behavior of some parents.
“We’re seeing some parents send kids to school even when they’re exhibiting symptoms consistent with COVID,” Campbell said. “That’s what we’ve observed, and that’s what’s led to the school closures we’ve seen.”
Sergienko summarized three things parents of students at schools in Tuolumne County can do to help slow the spread of COVID-19.
“Keep your kid home when they’re sick,” Sergienko said. “Get them tested if they’re sick. And if they’re eligible for vaccination, get them vaccinated. These are things people can do to keep schools open.”
Campbell asked when children under 12 will be eligible for vaccination against COVID-19. Sergienko said, “We don’t know that yet, but it’s anticipated. We’re hoping for guidance for ages 5 to 11 years old. We don’t know when that will come.”
Summerville High is supposed to remain closed Friday and Monday, Michael Merrill, superintendent for the Summerville Union High School District, said in an announcement sent to students, staff and parents on Thursday. Monday is the Labor Day holiday across the nation.
Asked about the increase in positive cases at Summerville, Merrill said, “We had five new cases in a period of four days.”
Merrill said he could not share whether those five cases were all students, or all staff, or a mix, due to guidelines that have been in place since the beginning of the pandemic early last year.
“Keeping Tuolumne County school staff and students safe has been the primary goal of all schools and public health since the beginning of the pandemic,” Jachetta said Thursday evening. “Our COVID-19 schools unit works closely with local public school administration to coordinate COVID-19 response and prevention activities.”