Opening Schools part 2
Alright, an update from yesterdays post...
First off, you are all impossible to please. BUT because of your fantastic feedback, we were able to make this table a bit more detailed. I added the ages of the grades that were opened and incidence of COVID19 (per 100,000). I also corresponded incidence rates to Harvard's "Key Metrics for COVID19 Suppression" (see Figure).
All the countries that opened schools were either GREEN (below 1 case per 100,000) or YELLOW (1-9 cases per 100,000).
As for the United States....
I added a graph of the incidence rates per state. As of today (and according to Harvard's standards), we have no GREEN states. However, about half of our states are YELLOW. The other states have high incidence rates: ORANGE or RED.
Each state, county, and city needs to pay attention to their incidence rate and plan accordingly. If a location is in the YELLOW or GREEN, I would also humbly suggest that they ALSO need to have their test positivity rates AT LEAST below 10% (5% would be ideal, according to the WHO).
Schools are not opening today. They are opening in a month or two. So we need to plan for ALL scenarios and be flexible. If we still have record breaking numbers in a month or two, we will have much bigger problems than opening up schools.
Love, your local epidemiologist
Sources: Harvard: https://globalepidemics.org/key-metrics-for-covid-suppress…/ . University of Washington, Global Health: https://globalhealth.washington.edu/…/COVID-19%20Schools%20…