Schools likely to return in the fall with caution, may require masks on students
Students may still need to wear masks in some areas, Moore says
TORONTO — There may not be high enough levels of immunity to COVID-19 across the province by September for kids to return to school unmasked, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health said Tuesday.
His comments came a day after the government’s science advisory table released recommendations for COVID-19 protocols in schools when they resume, including loosening rules on masking in low-risk scenarios.
Dr. Kieran Moore said he would define low risk in that context as a community that is seeing fewer than 10 cases per 100,000 people per week.
“It may be that we have a very cautious start in September and then monitor the situation because I don’t know that we’ll achieve that high community immunity that we need in September,” he said.
Roughly 80 per cent of eligible Ontarians have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, but Moore is hoping for 90
per cent to better protect the people of the province from the highly transmissible Delta variant.
Moore said he would support a regional approach to masking rules in schools, though that may be difficult to implement.
“We’ve seen across Ontario that the rates of illness can be quite variable and that Delta can suddenly surge, as it has in Grey Bruce and Waterloo or Porcupine and North Bay and then percolate in those communities,” he said.
The best thing that people can do to ensure schools can return safely is for as many eligible Ontarians as possible to get vaccinated, Moore said.
The science table recommended masking continue in moderate and high-risk scenarios. Schools should not close for in-person learning except in the most “catastrophic” situations, they said.
Dr. Nisha Thampi, one of the contributors to the report, said they want to minimize disruption to kids’ education, and tools such as testing and tracing, and masking are important ways to achieve that.
She emphasized that the report does not recommend ditching masks in September — rather, the low-risk part of the framework is forward-looking to a time when rates are very low and community immunity is very high.
“The masking should align with public health guidance for the low-risk scenario,” said Thampi, a pediatric infectious diseases physician.