Dewine must institute school mask mandate
As cases rise among Ohio’s children, Governor Dewine insists his hands are tied
It had been a while. h We had nearly forgotten what it was like to hear our governor — once a national voice in the fight against COVID-19 — preach the gospel of vaccines and the effectiveness of masks. h It was important that Mike Dewine returned to his pulpit with members of the Ohio Children’s Hospital
Association to stress the urgent need for masking in schools, but his message did not ring completely true.
As COVID-19 cases in kids soar and children’s hospitals fill up, Dewine insisted that his hands are tied and that he can’t issue a statewide mask mandate for K-12 schools due to Senate Bill 22, which allows lawmakers to modify or repeal health orders issued by a governor or the Ohio Department of Health.
“I vetoed the bill that gave the legislature the power,” Dewine said during the nearly 90 minute press conference Tuesday. “That veto, as you well know, because you reported it, was overridden by the state legislature. In addition to that, the state legislature has made it very clear to me that they will take off a health order if I put a health order on.”
‘Better angels’ have little pull
Dewine says fighting for a mask mandate in schools — something teachers’ unions and many school officials say they want, and reason dictates — would be counterproductive and create confusion.
Instead, his strategy is to appeal to the better angels, even though far too many school board members, superintendents and parents have been ignoring those very angels and squawking about masks
this entire time.
There is absolutely no evidence that once again hearing the truth about the pandemic will change the hearts or minds of those who incorrectly and irresponsibly insist that it is just like the flu or a figment of our collective imaginations.
Those same better angels were ignored at the onset of the pandemic when the elderly and those with certain health conditions were viewed as the most vulnerable.
Hostility around mask wearing and vaccines at school board meetings and the Statehouse is a clear indication those angels will continue to be ignored.
Dewine said every county in the state is red hot with COVID cases, with many boiling over. Children’s hospitals are feeling that heat in a big way.
There have been nearly 30,000 confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 for Ohio kids ages 5 to 17 since Aug. 15, according to the state.
The number of cases in that age range increased 198% from the week of Aug. 15 compared to the week ending Sept. 4.
The American Academy of Pediatrics reports that COVID-19 cases among children have increased 240% nationally since early July, when the delta variant began to take hold.
Cases for Ohio kids increased 2,000% during that same period.
Optimism goes only so far
The truth about coronavirus has been clouded by misinformation, some which is rooted in politics. A little less than half of the population of this state is fully vaccinated.
Dewine says he is optimistic.
It is naïve, not optimistic, to think that a news conference will convince the antivaxxers and COVID deniers influencing many school decisions to do the right thing.
The governor said that if he knew of anything other option, he would have done it.
What he needs to do is call lawmakers’ bluff.
Dewine needs to put politics aside and take a stand for children. For their very lives.
We call on the governor to institute a mask mandate for K-12 schools and fight his misguided Republican brethren over the issue in court if they lift it.
Let Senate President Matt Huffman and Ohio House Speaker Bob Cupp explain why it is OK to ignore legitimate scientists and health experts and instead follow the lead of people such as Dr. Sherri Tenpenny, who falsely, and with a straight face, said that vaccines make people magnetic.
Let them and their negligent members look into the eyes of parents of sick or dead children and explain why the words of people such as Tenpenny are more valuable in the Statehouse than those of Cincinnati Children’s Chief of Staff, Dr. Patty Manning.
“We have our hands full managing the tsunami of kids coming our way,” she said during that Tuesday news conference.
Manning shared research that found that kids in the partial-mandate schools were nearly twice as likely to test positive for COVID-19 as those with full mandates.
Nationwide Children’s in Columbus is experiencing record COVID-19 volumes, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Rustin Morse said.
“We are in uncharted territory from a medical perspective. Not just in children’s hospitals, but adult hospitals, as well,” he said. “The infrastructure to care for patients is being strained to a point where it’s never been before.”
This week, officials from Greater Columbus’ four largest healthcare systems, Nationwide included, once again sounded the alarm about hospital capacity.
“Our waiting rooms are filled with people seeking care for COVID-19. Hundreds of patients who have been admitted to our hospitals are still waiting in our emergency departments for beds in our intensive care and medical-surgical units to open,” they wrote in an open letter to the community.
There were 30 children in Nationwide with COVID on the day of Dewine’s press conference; 10 were in the intensive care unit. There were 20 kids in the hospital with COVID two weeks ago.
Cases among school-age children are increasing at nearly twice the rate of the rest of the population.
Dewine needs to seize control
Despite his assertions, Dewine is anything but powerless to help slow the spread of the disease among kids.
The legislature may have given itself power to repeal Dewine’s health orders, but they have not stolen away his power.
He needs the political courage; he and his staff already have shown they can be creative.
This ingenuity won Dewine prime spots on national news and headlines around the nation to discuss Vax-a-million, a vaccine lottery concept that encouraged people to get vaccinated by offering college scholarships and $5 million in cash prizes.
As one reporter pointed out during Tuesday’s press conference, Dewine is a “professional politician.”
In fact, Dewine — a former U.S. and Ohio senator, lieutenant governor, Ohio attorney general, and Greene County prosecutor — is perhaps one of the best politicians in Ohio’s history.
There are plenty of things he can dangle in front of lawmakers’ faces to get what he says he wants: healthy kids in classrooms.
He could have made the redistricting battle a lot more interesting or hold up other legislation for instance. Dewine needs to take control. Leading the state of Ohio is not the job of school superintendents or medial directors.
It is the governor’s responsibility. Surely, Dewine does not expect school boards and districts to courageously take on mobs of maskless COVID deniers if he won’t even square off with members of his own party.
He needs to find a way to exercise his power for the sake of Ohio kids, our future.
Editorials are The Dispatch Editorial Board’s fact-based assessment of issues of importance to the communities we serve. These are not the opinions of our reporting staff members, who strive for neutrality in their reporting.