King County virus woes keep school online only

The past 14-day COVID case count per 100,000 persons in the Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal Health regions is within a limit that would trigger a return to general in-class learning in similar-sized King County in Washington state.

King County's most recent reported accumulated two-week daily total was 94 cases per 100,000 residents.

Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal Health have reported 68 cases during the same period, per 100,000 residents. This takes into account King County serves 2.3 million people in and around the Seattle area, while Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal Health serve 3.05 million. In the past 14 days, there have been close to 2,100 cases of COVID-19 reported in the two B.C. health authorities — accounting for 90 per cent of the province's cases.

King County spokesperson Gabriel Spitzer said Washington state's Department of Health had developed a “decision tree” to govern when and how schools and child care organizations would reopen to general in-class learning, based on the 14-day case count per 100,000 persons.

Washington state's decision tree has three ranges of COVID incidence: high (above 75 cases over 14 days per 100,000 persons), moderate ( between 75 and 25 cases over 14 days per 100,000) and low. If the metric falls below 75, King County's public health officer Jeff Duchin has said schools would reopen, but it is yet to reach that mark.

Last Friday, Seattle Public Schools reported it would continue with virtual learning at least until Jan. 28, 2021 — the end of the semester.

In B.C., in-class learning resumed in the second week of September, though parents have an option to keep their kids at home while remaining registered with their school (until the end of the year.)

There has been one COVID-19 outbreak in a B.C. school, more than 200 exposures, and six clusters where several people had become sick at a school. There were three exposures reported in Coquitlam on Saturday — at Smiling Creek Elementary, Summit Middle and Winslow Centre — as well as at Vancouver College and Kelowna Secondary School. On Sunday an exposure was reported at Early Enquirers Preschool in West Vancouver as well as at Ecole Salish Secondary and Sullivan Heights Secondary in Surrey.