COVID19 Update - Day 144

US Tests: 55,847,627*

US Cases: 4,592,044*

US Deaths: 146,595*

Worldwide Cases: 17,791,377*

Worldwide Deaths: 683,988*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

So.  This was completely predictable:

One of the first school districts in the country to reopen its doors during the coronavirus pandemic did not even make it a day before being forced to grapple with the issue facing every system actively trying to get students into classrooms: What happens when someone comes to school infected?

Just hours into the first day of classes on Thursday, a call from the county health department notified Greenfield Central Junior High School in Indiana that a student who had walked the halls and sat in various classrooms had tested positive for the coronavirus.

Administrators began an emergency protocol, isolating the student and ordering everyone who had come into close contact with the person, including other students, to quarantine for 14 days. It is unclear whether the student infected anyone else.

“We knew it was a when, not if,” said Harold E. Olin, superintendent of the Greenfield-Central Community School Corporation, but were “very shocked it was on Day 1.”

I don't work in education, but I have some vague understanding the for certain students, especially very young students (elementary school), extended separation from classmates can cause issues with social development and other problems.  Those problems are real, and should be addressed separately from the question of reopening the schools (or not).

However, with that caveat, it is absolutely insane --- and a spectacular institutional failure --- that Trump and many governors have been pushing so hard for schools to return to business as usual in the fall.

Just. Don't. Do. It.

And on a separate note --- what the hell kind of school reopens in JULY, anyway?!?