Schools Are Going To Be Open But the Question Is ‘Will They Stay Open’?
Ohio's GOP governor recommends mandatory masks in schools
As vaccinations plod along in the United States, hampered by those on the political right who have stubbornly refused to get their shots — and in some cases, even spreading misinformation, or outright disinformation, about the vaccines — eyes are beginning to turn towards the new school year which is quickly approaching.
After the previous school year, marked by remote learning from home as schools themselves remained shuttered, many parents, educators and policymakers are eager for a new year which looks more like normal.
“Schools will be open. They need to be open. We need to make sure that they are safe and healthy,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the nation's second-largest teachers' union, the American Federation of Teachers. “We’ve launched our $5 million campaign to do back-to-school for all. So let’s just be really clear about that.”
That's not to say that they will necessarily stay that way, however, Weingarten added.
"So that’s why the next question about: Will they stay open, that’s where we worry, because when you have lots of kids, particularly every child under 12 has not been vaccinated,” she said.
Dr Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, said that Americans need to exercise a little more patience when it comes to making vaccination available to children younger than 12.
“Well, you know that that is being reviewed right now by the [Food and Drug Administration] FDA. Pfizer having submitted the data about that. The question is will they decide to issue that as an emergency use for that age group or will they fold it in when they put forward the full approval of the vaccine, which is also intensely under study and Peter Marks at FDA has just recently indicated it’s an all hands on deck effort to speed that up,” Dr Collins said, referring to the director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research within the FDA. “I know everybody wants that to happen as soon as possible but you want it done right.”
Meanwhile, the Republican governor of Ohio is recommending that school officials in his state mandate the wearing of masks in school buildings.
“I'll tell you what we have done. We came out last week with recommendations. They are recommendations. We leave it up to the local schools, 600 and some local schools. We leave it up to them, but we have a strong recommendation that, because the population in school, kids in school, most of them are unvaccinated, you know, obviously we can’t get anybody 11 and under vaccinated yet, so most these kids are on vaccinated. And we had great success last winter, last school year, we saw virtually no spread in the classroom when all the kids were wearing masks. So we recommend, strong recommendation to our schools, that they do that,” said Gov Mike DeWine. “Now, some will do that, some will not, but it’s clear the evidence shows that that’s a way to really slow down spread in the school and we think it's very important.”
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