It's time to declare this sinking OVER.
January 9, 2022 2:40 PM Subscribe
I mean a recent study *I* saw on social media showed that 99.9% of the time lifeboats just sat there doing nothing, taking up valuable space where there could be an extra shrimp buffet, and besides, half the crew weren't even sure how to deploy the dang things.
posted by offalark at 3:02 PM on January 9, 2022 [32 favorites]
posted by offalark at 3:02 PM on January 9, 2022 [32 favorites]
(This last one was sadly true for the RMS Lusitania, where half the lifeboats were collapsible, difficult to deploy, and the crew who had been drilled on deploying them were the ones who were killed in the boiler room explosion that sealed the ship's fate.)
posted by offalark at 3:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [18 favorites]
posted by offalark at 3:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [18 favorites]
"We're all sort of fellow travelers in a mighty small boat, in a mighty big ocean. And the more we quarrel, criticize and misunderstand each other, the bigger the ocean gets and the smaller the boat.”
-Lifeboat, 1944.
posted by clavdivs at 3:29 PM on January 9, 2022 [23 favorites]
-Lifeboat, 1944.
posted by clavdivs at 3:29 PM on January 9, 2022 [23 favorites]
"I had to take the batteries out of my carbon monoxide detector because the noise kept giving me a headache and making me dizzy."
posted by Jane the Brown at 3:36 PM on January 9, 2022 [126 favorites]
posted by Jane the Brown at 3:36 PM on January 9, 2022 [126 favorites]
Not enough attention is being paid here to the many potential horrors of longboat
posted by chavenet at 3:38 PM on January 9, 2022 [9 favorites]
posted by chavenet at 3:38 PM on January 9, 2022 [9 favorites]
I'm not anti-lifeboat by any means, but as anybody could tell you, statistically it's impossible for a non-tabular iceberg with dangerous spire protuberances to naturally form below 42 degrees latitude. So you have to ask yourself, how did the deadly "Greenland Iceberg" allegedly migrate all the way from some arctic ice shelf to just 1300 miles off the coast of New York? Perhaps there was a Nuuk research lab covering up experimenting with letting icebergs into the wild using gain-of-flotation to amplify their dispersal rate? And needless to say, Greenland is just a puppet of Denmark. With their incessant thirst for revenge against the Anglo speaking world after all the centuries of negative publicity caused by Hamlet, it seems a no-brainer that the Danes were behind the whole thing.
posted by xigxag at 3:45 PM on January 9, 2022 [39 favorites]
posted by xigxag at 3:45 PM on January 9, 2022 [39 favorites]
Hilarious ad in the thread: “To investors who want to retire comfortably”
posted by Melismata at 3:50 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by Melismata at 3:50 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
"Lifeboat isn’t real life. Go outside. Touch grass. Or seaweed; whatever’s down there."
posted by jamjam at 4:02 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
posted by jamjam at 4:02 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
The 5 stages of COVID:
1) I stand for medical freedom. I don't care if you've had your fucking vaccine. I'm the control group.
2) Have a headache and sore throat. FAUCI FOR PRISON THOUGH AMIRITE?
3) Had to go to the ER because I was having just a little trouble breathing.
4) Update from [insert name here]'s spouse: PRAYER WARRIORS NEEDED! [Insert name here] is having trouble keeping [his/her] oxygen above 80 even with full oxygen so [he/she] will be going on a vent. [Insert name here] is still in good spirits though. Jesus is greater than any COVID! Amen!
5) Update from [insert name here]'s spouse: [Insert name here] left to be with Jesus at [time of death from COVID]. [He/She] was the greatest [husband/wife] I could have ever asked for and was always kind and caring to people that [he/she] directly knew. We plan to have a massive in-person memorial service for them. FAUCI FOR PRISON!
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 4:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [63 favorites]
1) I stand for medical freedom. I don't care if you've had your fucking vaccine. I'm the control group.
2) Have a headache and sore throat. FAUCI FOR PRISON THOUGH AMIRITE?
3) Had to go to the ER because I was having just a little trouble breathing.
4) Update from [insert name here]'s spouse: PRAYER WARRIORS NEEDED! [Insert name here] is having trouble keeping [his/her] oxygen above 80 even with full oxygen so [he/she] will be going on a vent. [Insert name here] is still in good spirits though. Jesus is greater than any COVID! Amen!
5) Update from [insert name here]'s spouse: [Insert name here] left to be with Jesus at [time of death from COVID]. [He/She] was the greatest [husband/wife] I could have ever asked for and was always kind and caring to people that [he/she] directly knew. We plan to have a massive in-person memorial service for them. FAUCI FOR PRISON!
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 4:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [63 favorites]
You missed step 4b
4b) Update from [insert name here]'s spouse: I WAS KICKED OUT OF SATAN HOSPITAL FOR INSITING THEY USE GODS MEDICINE IVERMECTIN ON MY LOVE AND NOT WEAEING A FACE DIAPER. SO I MAY HAVE SPAT A LITTLE AT THE NAZI DOCTOR? *THEY* ARE THE ONES WHO SHED VACCINE PARTICLES ANYWAY.[Insert Name Here]'ll PULL THROUGH THEY ARE GODLY PEOPLE.
posted by lalochezia at 4:15 PM on January 9, 2022 [35 favorites]
4b) Update from [insert name here]'s spouse: I WAS KICKED OUT OF SATAN HOSPITAL FOR INSITING THEY USE GODS MEDICINE IVERMECTIN ON MY LOVE AND NOT WEAEING A FACE DIAPER. SO I MAY HAVE SPAT A LITTLE AT THE NAZI DOCTOR? *THEY* ARE THE ONES WHO SHED VACCINE PARTICLES ANYWAY.[Insert Name Here]'ll PULL THROUGH THEY ARE GODLY PEOPLE.
posted by lalochezia at 4:15 PM on January 9, 2022 [35 favorites]
Is this guy saying we should close schools? He might be right, but pediatricians disagree. So does the UN.
posted by eagles123 at 4:21 PM on January 9, 2022 [5 favorites]
posted by eagles123 at 4:21 PM on January 9, 2022 [5 favorites]
A religious man is on top of a roof during a great flood [hilarious joke] - Christian Funny Pictures - A time to laugh. Old old old joke I remember from childhood.
posted by zengargoyle at 4:21 PM on January 9, 2022 [10 favorites]
posted by zengargoyle at 4:21 PM on January 9, 2022 [10 favorites]
6) Please contribute to my GoFundMe. Thanks!
posted by SPrintF at 4:28 PM on January 9, 2022 [30 favorites]
posted by SPrintF at 4:28 PM on January 9, 2022 [30 favorites]
Clavdivs, I enjoy Lifeboat SO MUCH. All acting, all the characters, all the time.
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 4:43 PM on January 9, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 4:43 PM on January 9, 2022 [1 favorite]
UNESCO is saying we should "safely reopen" schools and roughly 0% of the people actually making decisions in most parts of the US give any shits about the first of those two words as long as they get the second accomplished.
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:44 PM on January 9, 2022 [32 favorites]
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:44 PM on January 9, 2022 [32 favorites]
For those unfamiliar with some of the context, this Twitter thread is pretty directly responding to claims like this and this - that depriving children of in-person learning is a catastrophe of such magnitude that any number of lives should be sacrified for it, sincerely worse than hundreds of thousands of deaths.
posted by All Might Be Well at 4:46 PM on January 9, 2022 [10 favorites]
posted by All Might Be Well at 4:46 PM on January 9, 2022 [10 favorites]
Is this guy saying we should close schools? He might be right, but pediatricians disagree. So does the UN.
More like that we should take precautions like requiring masks and putting air filters in the classrooms so that schools can remain open without being a constant superspreading event.
In many places, Omicron isn't giving us a choice anyway. In my county I live nearly a thousand teachers were out in the middle of last week. Administrators had to be put in the classroom so they could keep schools open. And that's not even getting into the chronic severe shortage of support staff like bus drivers. It's very likely schools will be shut down on zero notice in the next week or two simply because there won't be any staff to man them since new cases are still hitting record highs with test positivity rates around 40%.
Is that really better than going remote for a few weeks during the peak of the wave since the state has made it illegal to require students wear masks? Personally, I don't think so. It's not like the kids are actually being taught anything right now anyway. At least with remote they'd get something out of the time they're spending rather than the fuck all they get when people who aren't even teachers or haven't seen the inside of a classroom in decades are babysitting them. Plus it would keep a lot of people, kids included, from getting sick.
posted by wierdo at 4:49 PM on January 9, 2022 [26 favorites]
More like that we should take precautions like requiring masks and putting air filters in the classrooms so that schools can remain open without being a constant superspreading event.
In many places, Omicron isn't giving us a choice anyway. In my county I live nearly a thousand teachers were out in the middle of last week. Administrators had to be put in the classroom so they could keep schools open. And that's not even getting into the chronic severe shortage of support staff like bus drivers. It's very likely schools will be shut down on zero notice in the next week or two simply because there won't be any staff to man them since new cases are still hitting record highs with test positivity rates around 40%.
Is that really better than going remote for a few weeks during the peak of the wave since the state has made it illegal to require students wear masks? Personally, I don't think so. It's not like the kids are actually being taught anything right now anyway. At least with remote they'd get something out of the time they're spending rather than the fuck all they get when people who aren't even teachers or haven't seen the inside of a classroom in decades are babysitting them. Plus it would keep a lot of people, kids included, from getting sick.
posted by wierdo at 4:49 PM on January 9, 2022 [26 favorites]
> Is this guy saying we should close schools? He might be right, but pediatricians disagree. So does the UN.
I don't know when the AAP guidance was written, but it doesn't mention Omicron, and outlines a bunch of measures to protect kids that haven't been sufficiently adopted in most schools -- measures that depend on funding that isn't available and the labor of teachers who are getting sick themselves in large numbers. You can't just latch on to the one part that says kids should go to school without noting a serious lack of progress on the other things that get in the way of both their physical well-being and their ability to attend class.
posted by tonycpsu at 4:49 PM on January 9, 2022 [22 favorites]
I don't know when the AAP guidance was written, but it doesn't mention Omicron, and outlines a bunch of measures to protect kids that haven't been sufficiently adopted in most schools -- measures that depend on funding that isn't available and the labor of teachers who are getting sick themselves in large numbers. You can't just latch on to the one part that says kids should go to school without noting a serious lack of progress on the other things that get in the way of both their physical well-being and their ability to attend class.
posted by tonycpsu at 4:49 PM on January 9, 2022 [22 favorites]
xigxag, I'm not a super paranoid conspiracy theorist or anything, but.... Have you heard of Pykrete?
posted by Jacen at 4:50 PM on January 9, 2022 [5 favorites]
The five stages of covid.
My SO knows an internet couple, through a crafting activity, that went through this almost exactly. One day she was boasting about her god-given immunity powers, a week or so later he was telling the craft group she was dead.
posted by vrakatar at 4:58 PM on January 9, 2022 [8 favorites]
My SO knows an internet couple, through a crafting activity, that went through this almost exactly. One day she was boasting about her god-given immunity powers, a week or so later he was telling the craft group she was dead.
posted by vrakatar at 4:58 PM on January 9, 2022 [8 favorites]
Here's the Australian PM on schools reopening (5-11s can get vaccinated from today, so won't be double vaxxed by the time the new school year starts at the end of January, let alone supply issues)
"One of the big challenges we have is to balance that need to ensure that we have kids back at school, because we need kids back at school learning. We need kids back at school because it also has very significant impacts on the workforce availability — particularly in the health sector. And so, that is very important. And obviously, of course, above and beyond all of those issues is the health and welfare of the kids and those who work in the schools."
They don't care about education. They care about the workforce not having to stay home with children.
posted by freethefeet at 5:05 PM on January 9, 2022 [54 favorites]
"One of the big challenges we have is to balance that need to ensure that we have kids back at school, because we need kids back at school learning. We need kids back at school because it also has very significant impacts on the workforce availability — particularly in the health sector. And so, that is very important. And obviously, of course, above and beyond all of those issues is the health and welfare of the kids and those who work in the schools."
They don't care about education. They care about the workforce not having to stay home with children.
posted by freethefeet at 5:05 PM on January 9, 2022 [54 favorites]
I'm tempted to repost my experience with the ER five months ago, but I really don't have the heart.
posted by Jacen at 5:07 PM on January 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Jacen at 5:07 PM on January 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
How about latching onto one source in a post? The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia link specifically mentions Omicron, as does the American Association of Pediatricians page as of January 5th, which is definitely post Omicron. Sorry, they might be wrong, but you all aren’t on the side of the “experts” here.
Also: Not all states have made it illegal for kids to wear masks. None of the states around me have.
posted by eagles123 at 5:07 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
Also: Not all states have made it illegal for kids to wear masks. None of the states around me have.
posted by eagles123 at 5:07 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
They don't care about education. They care about the workforce not having to stay home with children.
Once you realize that a lot of people regard K-12 teachers as a subcategory of "babysitter" (itself a subcategory of "servant") both their disdain for remote schooling and shocking rage at teachers' unions becomes more legible.
posted by Pope Guilty at 5:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [52 favorites]
Once you realize that a lot of people regard K-12 teachers as a subcategory of "babysitter" (itself a subcategory of "servant") both their disdain for remote schooling and shocking rage at teachers' unions becomes more legible.
posted by Pope Guilty at 5:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [52 favorites]
> How about latching onto one source in a post? The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia link specifically mentions Omicron, as does the American Association of Pediatricians page as of January 5th, which is definitely post Omicron. Sorry, they might be wrong, but you all aren’t on the side of the “experts” here.
Then it would appear you've been a bit careless with your links. The AAP page you linked two has an update date in November of last year, and there is no CHOP link that I'm seeing.
posted by tonycpsu at 5:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [4 favorites]
Then it would appear you've been a bit careless with your links. The AAP page you linked two has an update date in November of last year, and there is no CHOP link that I'm seeing.
posted by tonycpsu at 5:11 PM on January 9, 2022 [4 favorites]
I really needed this laugh.
posted by interogative mood at 5:17 PM on January 9, 2022
posted by interogative mood at 5:17 PM on January 9, 2022
Your right. Not sure how that happened. Here is the CHOP link: link.
Here is the link to the AAP news page from January 5th, which links to the guidance I’ve posted. Not sure why they didn’t change the date on that page.
Link.
posted by eagles123 at 5:28 PM on January 9, 2022 [4 favorites]
Here is the link to the AAP news page from January 5th, which links to the guidance I’ve posted. Not sure why they didn’t change the date on that page.
Link.
posted by eagles123 at 5:28 PM on January 9, 2022 [4 favorites]
From your link:
“We know that some children are really suffering without the support of in-person classroom experiences or adequate technology at home. We need governments at the state and federal levels to prioritize funding the needed safety accommodations, such as improving ventilation systems and providing personal protective equipment for teachers and staff.”
I've bolded all of the prerequisites that AAP's advocating.
Stop saying "pediatricians say to open schools" when it's very clear that they're saying "get your ducks in a row so that we CAN open schools."
posted by explosion at 5:41 PM on January 9, 2022 [59 favorites]
“We know that some children are really suffering without the support of in-person classroom experiences or adequate technology at home. We need governments at the state and federal levels to prioritize funding the needed safety accommodations, such as improving ventilation systems and providing personal protective equipment for teachers and staff.”
I've bolded all of the prerequisites that AAP's advocating.
Stop saying "pediatricians say to open schools" when it's very clear that they're saying "get your ducks in a row so that we CAN open schools."
posted by explosion at 5:41 PM on January 9, 2022 [59 favorites]
We will keep this ship sailing as long as we have enough crew members to man the ship. If enough drown, we'll postpone continuing until they return.
posted by Joey Michaels at 5:43 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by Joey Michaels at 5:43 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
A student's report from a New York public high school.
posted by LindsayIrene at 5:44 PM on January 9, 2022 [20 favorites]
posted by LindsayIrene at 5:44 PM on January 9, 2022 [20 favorites]
I will not. The people in this thread might torture the links I’ve provided to agree with their own prejudices, but the position of the profession could not be more clear. Obviously, if there aren’t enough staff to open the school due to quarantine it can’t open, but those closures would be temporary. Also, obviously they are also advocating for masking, testing etc. as well.
Edit: And it’s clear from the CHOP link they want schools open everything else being equal. If they weren’t, they’d be advocating for school closures, which they aren’t. I’m about to post the entire text in this thread when I get to a place where it’s feasible because I don’t appreciate the implication I am being misleading.
posted by eagles123 at 5:50 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
Edit: And it’s clear from the CHOP link they want schools open everything else being equal. If they weren’t, they’d be advocating for school closures, which they aren’t. I’m about to post the entire text in this thread when I get to a place where it’s feasible because I don’t appreciate the implication I am being misleading.
posted by eagles123 at 5:50 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
[SPrintF]: 6) Please contribute to my GoFundMe. Thanks!If only... They have GiveSendGo (no I will not link it) as the "Good Christian"™ equivalent, the Godly choice suitable for discerning vaccine denialists, megachurch preachers, and mass shooters.
posted by mystyk at 5:56 PM on January 9, 2022 [1 favorite]
Also, note that that isn't Random J. High School, that's the state of things in one of the best high schools in the city: https://www.bxscience.edu/
posted by pan at 5:58 PM on January 9, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by pan at 5:58 PM on January 9, 2022 [2 favorites]
4.5) COVID IS NO JOKE!
* you need r/HermanCainAward for context
posted by rdr at 6:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
* you need r/HermanCainAward for context
posted by rdr at 6:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
I'm hesitant to weigh in here because clearly the prevailing mood in this thread is not on the side of schools being open. But I respect this community, and I want to share my experience because it is directly relevant to what is being discussed here. I hope people will read it with an open mind.
I am a physician in a pediatric hospital. In my experience, the health risk to children from schools being open is substantially less than the risk from them being closed. I say this because of the vast numbers of children I have seen over the last two years admitted with what I will call sequelae of social isolation -- overdoses, eating disorders, suicide attempts, acute psychiatric decompensation, accidents related to intoxication, malnutrition, somatization syndromes, child endangerment and abuse -- far beyond what we have ever seen before, and rising and falling in waves clearly related to the closure and opening of the local school systems. And the worst effects are falling heavily on children from low-SES families. I've written about it here before. Many of these children have died. Opening schools is *not* just a matter of convenience for parents or employers and it saddens me to see that assumption expressed here. It is a matter of life and death.
The direct morbidity of COVID infection has been far, far less in our kids than the indirect morbidity from social isolation. It's certainly true that pediatric hospitalizations have increased during the Omicron wave; I know that in some cases too much has been made of the distinction between admissions *for* COVID and admissions *with* COVID (ie. an incidental finding of asymptomatic infection), but in my experience there has indeed been a real difference between the two. The former have been few and far between at our hospital so far; our only severe cases of acute COVID infection have involved young infants of mothers who did not get vaccinated.
(Incidentally, while I have you here -- the risk of myocarditis from the mRNA vaccines is vastly overstated.)
So it's no surprise that bodies including the Canadian Pediatrics Society and the Ontario Medical Association are advocating for schools to reopen here. I would strongly recommend that you read the CPS statement, which verifies that what I personally have seen and described above is not unique to my hospital. Of course they have been advocating through other avenues, as has the AAP in the statement above, for things like mask and vaccine mandates, ventilation, and testing resources. But their advocacy for schools to be open is unqualified:
posted by saturday_morning at 6:19 PM on January 9, 2022 [128 favorites]
I am a physician in a pediatric hospital. In my experience, the health risk to children from schools being open is substantially less than the risk from them being closed. I say this because of the vast numbers of children I have seen over the last two years admitted with what I will call sequelae of social isolation -- overdoses, eating disorders, suicide attempts, acute psychiatric decompensation, accidents related to intoxication, malnutrition, somatization syndromes, child endangerment and abuse -- far beyond what we have ever seen before, and rising and falling in waves clearly related to the closure and opening of the local school systems. And the worst effects are falling heavily on children from low-SES families. I've written about it here before. Many of these children have died. Opening schools is *not* just a matter of convenience for parents or employers and it saddens me to see that assumption expressed here. It is a matter of life and death.
The direct morbidity of COVID infection has been far, far less in our kids than the indirect morbidity from social isolation. It's certainly true that pediatric hospitalizations have increased during the Omicron wave; I know that in some cases too much has been made of the distinction between admissions *for* COVID and admissions *with* COVID (ie. an incidental finding of asymptomatic infection), but in my experience there has indeed been a real difference between the two. The former have been few and far between at our hospital so far; our only severe cases of acute COVID infection have involved young infants of mothers who did not get vaccinated.
(Incidentally, while I have you here -- the risk of myocarditis from the mRNA vaccines is vastly overstated.)
So it's no surprise that bodies including the Canadian Pediatrics Society and the Ontario Medical Association are advocating for schools to reopen here. I would strongly recommend that you read the CPS statement, which verifies that what I personally have seen and described above is not unique to my hospital. Of course they have been advocating through other avenues, as has the AAP in the statement above, for things like mask and vaccine mandates, ventilation, and testing resources. But their advocacy for schools to be open is unqualified:
Online learning is harmful. Social isolation and prolonged in-person school closures have precipitated increases in unhealthy behaviours[...]In our hospitals and clinics, we see the results: increased depression and anxiety, suicidality, eating disorders, learning losses, and delayed development. These clinical observations are reflected at the population level and have been documented by researchers across the country. The deteriorating health and well-being of our children and youth is also a public health emergency.[...]My expertise is limited to children's health. Their health interests may conflict with those of educators, or of vulnerable people in the community for whom any increase in infection rates is a threat. These are legitimate dilemmas and I can't speak authoritatively about them. But I wanted to clarify in case there are doubts here about the position of the pediatric profession. We want children in school.
Just as the devastation caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus has not been equally distributed, neither have the effects of school closures and remote learning. These measures have disproportionately affected children and youth from racialized communities, those living in single-parent households or in perilous economic circumstances, as well as those with pre-COVID mental health conditions or with disabilities. School is a source of essential programs, services, and therapies. Over the past two years, those supports have been either absent or radically disrupted.[...]
Data suggest closing schools during other waves of the pandemic has been an ineffective strategy. Studies from British Columbia—where schools have been open since May 2020—show that while cases of COVID-19 in schools do indeed reflect the level of virus in the community, there are few transmissions in school. In addition, teachers were no more likely than others in the community to have COVID-19.[...]
We urge you to return children and youth to in-person learning no later than January 17th and to commit to no further disruptions to the 2021-22 school year.
posted by saturday_morning at 6:19 PM on January 9, 2022 [128 favorites]
Thank you saturday_morning. As the parent of a child who developed serious psychological problems during a year of remote schooling I appreciate your perspective very much.
posted by medusa at 6:24 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
posted by medusa at 6:24 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
What makes having conversations like that - thank you, saturday_morning - difficult is that the prevailing forms of the promotion of reopening (safely) are not as articulate and mostly conjoined with anti-vaccination sentiment
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 6:39 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 6:39 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
There's a world of difference between closing schools for a few weeks and closing them for many months. I don't think anyone is suggesting closing schools until September or anything like that. We have to balance the harm of a few weeks of online schooling versus not just Covid and long Covid in kids, but also in their at-risk parents and other contacts, plus increased community transmission leading to overwhelmed hospitals in the very near future. Especially right now, when kids can have their first or second vaccine dose in the next few weeks.
Data suggest closing schools during other waves of the pandemic has been an ineffective strategy. Studies from British Columbia—where schools have been open since May 2020—show that while cases of COVID-19 in schools do indeed reflect the level of virus in the community, there are few transmissions in school.
BC does indeed claim this, but they also didn't really track Covid in schools in a way that would have allowed them to actually determine if it was true or not on a large scale (and this was pre-Omicron and mostly even pre-Delta). The two studies cited here were tiny, with very low case numbers. Now, with Omicron, this seems highly unlikely to be true and our testing is so limited that we have absolutely no way to detect this.
posted by ssg at 6:42 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
Data suggest closing schools during other waves of the pandemic has been an ineffective strategy. Studies from British Columbia—where schools have been open since May 2020—show that while cases of COVID-19 in schools do indeed reflect the level of virus in the community, there are few transmissions in school.
BC does indeed claim this, but they also didn't really track Covid in schools in a way that would have allowed them to actually determine if it was true or not on a large scale (and this was pre-Omicron and mostly even pre-Delta). The two studies cited here were tiny, with very low case numbers. Now, with Omicron, this seems highly unlikely to be true and our testing is so limited that we have absolutely no way to detect this.
posted by ssg at 6:42 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
I think it is funny that all of these super concerned adults have conflated "helping kids" with "opening schools so that the workforce can go get seriously ill". And by funny I mean not funny.
posted by pdoege at 6:47 PM on January 9, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by pdoege at 6:47 PM on January 9, 2022 [13 favorites]
It seems relevant that Canada's population-adjusted new case/death rates are a half and a quarter of the US's, respectively. It may be true that, setting regional differences aside, it makes sense to open more schools in Canada but close more schools in the United States.
posted by tonycpsu at 6:55 PM on January 9, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by tonycpsu at 6:55 PM on January 9, 2022 [2 favorites]
Yeah, one of the huge problems is that kids may fare worse without school, but if too many adults are too ill to MAINTAIN the school.... then guess what, you still can't actually have in-person school. Look at that report from the NYC kid: all they do is sit there for 3 hours doing nothing with subs, getting exposed to Covid. That's not learning. That's putting themselves at high risk for getting it (they already have) for learning nothing. Unless we somehow magically get an automated school taught by remotely controlled robots, good luck with this.
What I'm confused by is, if we're closed for a month (which my alma mater now is), is anything actually going to get less bad in a month? Or does omicron continue and THEN we get another variant or two after that? Is saying we're only closing for a month complete wishful thinking? Because nothing really seems to ever blow over with covid. It just morphs into another horrible thing.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:04 PM on January 9, 2022 [22 favorites]
What I'm confused by is, if we're closed for a month (which my alma mater now is), is anything actually going to get less bad in a month? Or does omicron continue and THEN we get another variant or two after that? Is saying we're only closing for a month complete wishful thinking? Because nothing really seems to ever blow over with covid. It just morphs into another horrible thing.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:04 PM on January 9, 2022 [22 favorites]
I find the linked Twitter thread to be dismissive and distasteful. You can win any argument if you choose to portray your opponents as fools ignoring a sinking ship.
In general I'm pretty suspicious of any social media that makes you feel good because you're so smart (compared to those ignorant bumpkins who just don't get it).
posted by crazy with stars at 7:33 PM on January 9, 2022 [7 favorites]
In general I'm pretty suspicious of any social media that makes you feel good because you're so smart (compared to those ignorant bumpkins who just don't get it).
posted by crazy with stars at 7:33 PM on January 9, 2022 [7 favorites]
4.5) COVID IS NO JOKE!
* you need r/HermanCainAward for context
posted by otherchaz at 7:37 PM on January 9, 2022
* you need r/HermanCainAward for context
posted by otherchaz at 7:37 PM on January 9, 2022
As a parent with two school aged children that have been seriously affected by School closing last year, I want to ask that we all give space for some grace between us. I find metafilter to mostly have the ability to discuss complex topics like this without assuming bad faith, and there are valid arguments on both sides. There is a societal cost and psychological impact to our kids when closing schools. This will have unintended consequences for generations. There are also people getting sick and dying right now and not taking appropriate steps is criminal.
Thanks All Might Be Well for providing the context. The author is responding to what I consider a ham fisted attempt by a statistician to boil a complex situation down to empirical numbers. I think I saw in the twitter comments the statement that “There are no good options in a Pandemic”. I think that is true in this case.
I’m in favor of closing schools at this point, my kids are dead set against it. As others have pointed out above, staying in school when the kids aren’t learning is no good, but rampant spread of omicron is taking the decision out of our hands anyway.
posted by herda05 at 7:55 PM on January 9, 2022 [12 favorites]
Thanks All Might Be Well for providing the context. The author is responding to what I consider a ham fisted attempt by a statistician to boil a complex situation down to empirical numbers. I think I saw in the twitter comments the statement that “There are no good options in a Pandemic”. I think that is true in this case.
I’m in favor of closing schools at this point, my kids are dead set against it. As others have pointed out above, staying in school when the kids aren’t learning is no good, but rampant spread of omicron is taking the decision out of our hands anyway.
posted by herda05 at 7:55 PM on January 9, 2022 [12 favorites]
What I'm confused by is, if we're closed for a month (which my alma mater now is), is anything actually going to get less bad in a month? Or does omicron continue and THEN we get another variant or two after that?
Of course, we don't know. We can only make the best decision we can right now. And right now, we've set new records today for hospitalizations in both the US and Canada and we've already baked in more from cases in recent days. We can choose to use the public health tools at our disposal to reduce the coming peak or we can choose to just let it go.
Reducing the coming peak doesn't just protect hospitals, it gives us more time to get people 3rd shots, it gives us more time to produce Paxlovid and it reduces the total number who will be infected in this wave.
Omicron cases will come down at some point. Enough people will get infected that transmission will slow and cases start to decline. In South Africa, it looks like they've already peaked and maybe in London too.
All we can do to reduce the chances of the next variant is do everything we can to reduce the number of cases worldwide, which means vaccinating and boosting as many people as possible, as quickly as possible and keeping case numbers as low as we reasonably can otherwise.
posted by ssg at 8:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
Of course, we don't know. We can only make the best decision we can right now. And right now, we've set new records today for hospitalizations in both the US and Canada and we've already baked in more from cases in recent days. We can choose to use the public health tools at our disposal to reduce the coming peak or we can choose to just let it go.
Reducing the coming peak doesn't just protect hospitals, it gives us more time to get people 3rd shots, it gives us more time to produce Paxlovid and it reduces the total number who will be infected in this wave.
Omicron cases will come down at some point. Enough people will get infected that transmission will slow and cases start to decline. In South Africa, it looks like they've already peaked and maybe in London too.
All we can do to reduce the chances of the next variant is do everything we can to reduce the number of cases worldwide, which means vaccinating and boosting as many people as possible, as quickly as possible and keeping case numbers as low as we reasonably can otherwise.
posted by ssg at 8:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [6 favorites]
What I'm confused by is, if we're closed for a month (which my alma mater now is), is anything actually going to get less bad in a month?
Yes, it is likely that in any given locality the extreme rates of community transmission that we are seeing in much of the US will only last for about a month. Even here in Florida, new cases have been pretty stable since the middle of the last week, and it doesn't appear to be due to maxed out testing capacity. Lines are super long in a lot of places and labs are totally slammed, but people are mostly willing to wait. Growth in hospitalizations is half what it was a week ago, so that's another data point indicating that transmission is peaking or may have already peaked.
My position on the school situation isn't out of fear, it's out of actual experience. Kids are largely not getting taught right now anyway where I live. A metric crap ton of them aren't even in school anyway because they are out sick with COVID. And more teachers are either getting sick themselves, are having close contacts test positive, or having to stay home to care for their own sick kids.
Compared to what is happening, going remote for a month would have been a much better choice in hindsight. It's not as if the infrastructure, including already paid for take home computers, isn't already in place.
That said, I get where people are coming from. It's disruptive to the kids and the parents to close schools. I'm not sure that it's more disruptive than the overall situation, but our collective unwillingness to provide any further support makes it a scary proposition for many people who are in a financially precarious situation. We should at the least be providing unemployment benefits to make up for lost wages if a parent has to stay home to watch their child(ren) or care for them during an illness.
Yeah, it's expensive, and yeah, the disruptions are driving a lot of inflation, but that's happening anyway because so damn many people are getting sick. Maybe if we spent the fucking money fewer people would get ill in the first place and would be available to go back to work more quickly.
I guess my overall point is that we need to be more adaptable to the current conditions in any given place. When community transmission is low, it's reasonably safe to proceed as normal, just with masks and other mitigations. But when community transmission starts to spike, we need to take significant action to prevent the kind of clusterfuck we are seeing.
If things were only slightly worse, it wouldn't just be kids not being able to have normal classes, it would be no food on the fucking shelves at the grocery store, if the store could even remain open. We're on the goddamned knife edge here, and if Omicron were much worse (either by being more severe or just by having a longer course of disease) we'd be seeing more than just minor supply disruptions, we'd have a wholesale breakdown of commerce and some people would likely starve as a result.
Thankfully, we aren't in that reality, in large part due to the reasonably successful, if still disappointing due to the number of refuseniks, vaccination campaign. The next variant may not be so kind to us, so we have to learn from this round. Paxlovid may decrease the risk if it can be produced in sufficient quantity, but we still need better access to testing so that people can get it in time and we must be prepared for the possibility that a wave may make it impossible for enough people to work that things still go sideways despite a drastically reduced mortality rate from COVID itself. A variant with Omicron's transmissibility and an even modestly longer recovery time could really fuck things up in ways we really are not prepared for.
posted by wierdo at 8:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
Yes, it is likely that in any given locality the extreme rates of community transmission that we are seeing in much of the US will only last for about a month. Even here in Florida, new cases have been pretty stable since the middle of the last week, and it doesn't appear to be due to maxed out testing capacity. Lines are super long in a lot of places and labs are totally slammed, but people are mostly willing to wait. Growth in hospitalizations is half what it was a week ago, so that's another data point indicating that transmission is peaking or may have already peaked.
My position on the school situation isn't out of fear, it's out of actual experience. Kids are largely not getting taught right now anyway where I live. A metric crap ton of them aren't even in school anyway because they are out sick with COVID. And more teachers are either getting sick themselves, are having close contacts test positive, or having to stay home to care for their own sick kids.
Compared to what is happening, going remote for a month would have been a much better choice in hindsight. It's not as if the infrastructure, including already paid for take home computers, isn't already in place.
That said, I get where people are coming from. It's disruptive to the kids and the parents to close schools. I'm not sure that it's more disruptive than the overall situation, but our collective unwillingness to provide any further support makes it a scary proposition for many people who are in a financially precarious situation. We should at the least be providing unemployment benefits to make up for lost wages if a parent has to stay home to watch their child(ren) or care for them during an illness.
Yeah, it's expensive, and yeah, the disruptions are driving a lot of inflation, but that's happening anyway because so damn many people are getting sick. Maybe if we spent the fucking money fewer people would get ill in the first place and would be available to go back to work more quickly.
I guess my overall point is that we need to be more adaptable to the current conditions in any given place. When community transmission is low, it's reasonably safe to proceed as normal, just with masks and other mitigations. But when community transmission starts to spike, we need to take significant action to prevent the kind of clusterfuck we are seeing.
If things were only slightly worse, it wouldn't just be kids not being able to have normal classes, it would be no food on the fucking shelves at the grocery store, if the store could even remain open. We're on the goddamned knife edge here, and if Omicron were much worse (either by being more severe or just by having a longer course of disease) we'd be seeing more than just minor supply disruptions, we'd have a wholesale breakdown of commerce and some people would likely starve as a result.
Thankfully, we aren't in that reality, in large part due to the reasonably successful, if still disappointing due to the number of refuseniks, vaccination campaign. The next variant may not be so kind to us, so we have to learn from this round. Paxlovid may decrease the risk if it can be produced in sufficient quantity, but we still need better access to testing so that people can get it in time and we must be prepared for the possibility that a wave may make it impossible for enough people to work that things still go sideways despite a drastically reduced mortality rate from COVID itself. A variant with Omicron's transmissibility and an even modestly longer recovery time could really fuck things up in ways we really are not prepared for.
posted by wierdo at 8:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [14 favorites]
no food on the fucking shelves at the grocery store
This is happening, FYI. I guess not 'no food' exactly, but severe shortages of staples.
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 9:06 PM on January 9, 2022 [2 favorites]
This is happening, FYI. I guess not 'no food' exactly, but severe shortages of staples.
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 9:06 PM on January 9, 2022 [2 favorites]
> As a parent with two school aged children that have been seriously affected by School closing last year, I want to ask that we all give space for some grace between us. I find metafilter to mostly have the ability to discuss complex topics like this without assuming bad faith, and there are valid arguments on both sides. There is a societal cost and psychological impact to our kids when closing schools. This will have unintended consequences for generations. There are also people getting sick and dying right now and not taking appropriate steps is criminal.
I don't see any bad faith evident in this thread, but we all have blind spots that lead us to view the same data points in different ways, and will sometimes make errors in favor of the position that aligns with our personal stake in the issue. For example, a parent with kids in a school that has more resources for testing, larger classrooms, and fewer students per teacher will likely come to different conclusions about continuing to send kids into that school than a parent with kids at a school without those luxuries. Similarly, parents in general will tend to prioritize the well-being of children, who tend not to have life-threatening outcomes from the disease, over the well-being of adults who might get infected by those children, and who will have more life-threatening outcomes from the disease.
I'm sure everyone tries to consider these factors into their risk equation, but the weights they assign to each factor are generally going to break in favor of what they believe will be best for those they love most. In this case, there's no reliable way to measure what you estimate to be a significant increase in the quality of education your kid gets over some unknowable but certainly nonzero percentage increase in the spread of Covid because schools are open. We don't have the data for these things, so we fill in the blanks, sometimes in ways that align with our biases.
With this in mind, I do not see a problem with laughing along with a Twitter thread like this, which parodies views that may not be expressed very often here on MetaFilter, but are certainly expressed often in the larger population. Are those views representative of all parents who want to reopen schools? No, of course not, but they're nonetheless very prevalent in the conversation. Likewise, there's nothing wrong with pointing out where you believe another member here might be looking at the data through a distorted lens, as long as you're willing to respond in kind if your views are challenged.
> “There are no good options in a Pandemic”.
Maybe not, but there are options that are less bad than others. Sometimes we have a really good idea of which are which -- e.g. I think those who supported locking down in the beginning have been vindicated -- and sometimes the answer isn't as clear, like with this debate about whether schools should remain open in areas with relatively high levels of community spread with this new variant that spreads faster but doesn't result in serious symptoms as often. So we present our views, knowing full well they may be challenged by others, and we respond to those challenges, and we try to learn in the process. And sometimes, we just want to laugh at a thread that puts things in a way that resonates with us. That's okay, too.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [10 favorites]
I don't see any bad faith evident in this thread, but we all have blind spots that lead us to view the same data points in different ways, and will sometimes make errors in favor of the position that aligns with our personal stake in the issue. For example, a parent with kids in a school that has more resources for testing, larger classrooms, and fewer students per teacher will likely come to different conclusions about continuing to send kids into that school than a parent with kids at a school without those luxuries. Similarly, parents in general will tend to prioritize the well-being of children, who tend not to have life-threatening outcomes from the disease, over the well-being of adults who might get infected by those children, and who will have more life-threatening outcomes from the disease.
I'm sure everyone tries to consider these factors into their risk equation, but the weights they assign to each factor are generally going to break in favor of what they believe will be best for those they love most. In this case, there's no reliable way to measure what you estimate to be a significant increase in the quality of education your kid gets over some unknowable but certainly nonzero percentage increase in the spread of Covid because schools are open. We don't have the data for these things, so we fill in the blanks, sometimes in ways that align with our biases.
With this in mind, I do not see a problem with laughing along with a Twitter thread like this, which parodies views that may not be expressed very often here on MetaFilter, but are certainly expressed often in the larger population. Are those views representative of all parents who want to reopen schools? No, of course not, but they're nonetheless very prevalent in the conversation. Likewise, there's nothing wrong with pointing out where you believe another member here might be looking at the data through a distorted lens, as long as you're willing to respond in kind if your views are challenged.
> “There are no good options in a Pandemic”.
Maybe not, but there are options that are less bad than others. Sometimes we have a really good idea of which are which -- e.g. I think those who supported locking down in the beginning have been vindicated -- and sometimes the answer isn't as clear, like with this debate about whether schools should remain open in areas with relatively high levels of community spread with this new variant that spreads faster but doesn't result in serious symptoms as often. So we present our views, knowing full well they may be challenged by others, and we respond to those challenges, and we try to learn in the process. And sometimes, we just want to laugh at a thread that puts things in a way that resonates with us. That's okay, too.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:17 PM on January 9, 2022 [10 favorites]
Right now, if adults get sick with COVID, they come back in two weeks. The virus isn't permanent and most vaccinated people aren't dying to the virus. I don't get where the labour shortage argument is coming from as it only works if the illness is permanent, which it isn't for most people. I am triple vaccinated, caught COVID on Dec 31 and symptoms lasted for a few days. I was not permanently out of the workforce.
I have argued in a previous thread that the COVID precautionary measures appear to be largely benefiting older people, while the costs to run the precautionary measures are largely falling on younger generations. COVID mortality in the unvaccinated was significantly higher in people 50 years and above. People below fifty didn't have as much to worry. We now have vaccines, which have reduced mortality further. But the brunt of running our precautionary measures is being shouldered on Gen Z and younger. They are being hampered in their ability to enter into the trained workforce, they will be saddled with the debt that we're taking on, and their social connections are being disrupted for a disease that still largely doesn't affect them.
posted by DetriusXii at 9:19 PM on January 9, 2022 [1 favorite]
I have argued in a previous thread that the COVID precautionary measures appear to be largely benefiting older people, while the costs to run the precautionary measures are largely falling on younger generations. COVID mortality in the unvaccinated was significantly higher in people 50 years and above. People below fifty didn't have as much to worry. We now have vaccines, which have reduced mortality further. But the brunt of running our precautionary measures is being shouldered on Gen Z and younger. They are being hampered in their ability to enter into the trained workforce, they will be saddled with the debt that we're taking on, and their social connections are being disrupted for a disease that still largely doesn't affect them.
posted by DetriusXii at 9:19 PM on January 9, 2022 [1 favorite]
> Right now, if adults get sick with COVID, they come back in two weeks.
You're missing an important word or phrase here, like "usually" or "on average". Yes, thankfully, the most prominent variant is not as deadly, and our doctors and nurses have gotten much better at treating the disease to prevent deaths. However, Omicron isn't mild for hospitals, and we are reaching a breaking point for our medical staff to keep us -- well, most of us -- alive when we get sick.
> The virus isn't permanent
There's a long Covid thread like three threads up from this one. The virus itself goes away, but there are definitely people suffering long after it's done infecting them. Dismissing this does not do your argument any favors.
> I don't get where the labour shortage argument is coming from as it only works if the illness is permanent, which it isn't for most people.
The case counts we're seeing can easily explain a labor shortage even if people are only out for a week, and even if relatively few of them have longer-term symptoms. There is also some "great resignation" effect where people who had the option to do so are opting out of coming back, but I seriously doubt there are that many teachers who didn't leave during the first few waves who are suddenly opting out now, or a lot of qualified teachers eager to take their place.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:36 PM on January 9, 2022 [20 favorites]
You're missing an important word or phrase here, like "usually" or "on average". Yes, thankfully, the most prominent variant is not as deadly, and our doctors and nurses have gotten much better at treating the disease to prevent deaths. However, Omicron isn't mild for hospitals, and we are reaching a breaking point for our medical staff to keep us -- well, most of us -- alive when we get sick.
> The virus isn't permanent
There's a long Covid thread like three threads up from this one. The virus itself goes away, but there are definitely people suffering long after it's done infecting them. Dismissing this does not do your argument any favors.
> I don't get where the labour shortage argument is coming from as it only works if the illness is permanent, which it isn't for most people.
The case counts we're seeing can easily explain a labor shortage even if people are only out for a week, and even if relatively few of them have longer-term symptoms. There is also some "great resignation" effect where people who had the option to do so are opting out of coming back, but I seriously doubt there are that many teachers who didn't leave during the first few waves who are suddenly opting out now, or a lot of qualified teachers eager to take their place.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:36 PM on January 9, 2022 [20 favorites]
Are those views representative of all parents who want to reopen schools?
The Twitter thread isn't parodying parents, it's parodying politicians like Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott and astroturf organizations like Moms For Liberty and their ilk, whose members are storming school board meetings with equally idiotic arguments and threatening and doxxing the members of said boards on the rare occasion that they aren't actually committing the crime of terroristic threatening. This shit is about as authentic as the Brooks Brothers Riot of 2000.
Speaking to DetriusXii's point, the claim isn't that enough people will be permanently unable to work to cause catastrophic consequences, it's that enough people are falling ill at the same time that it's becoming nearly impossible for essential societal functions to be performed for a few weeks. We're closer to the tipping point between inconvenient intermittent shortages and complete, if temporary, supply chain breakdown for goods essential for sustaining life than almost anyone is willing to admit.
It's almost certain we will not reach that tipping point with Omicron thanks to vaccination, but it wouldn't have taken much for it to have gone the other way. If Omicron was as severe as Delta or if it was as good at escaping vaccination immunity as it is immunity acquired from previous infection, it very well could have gone the other way.
The evidence is right there in front of our faces. We've been discussing in this very thread how some school systems are being forced to close temporarily due to staff shortages and that a great many more are under such serious strain that they're basically only providing daycare at this point. Is it really so hard to see how the same thing could happen to other organizations that rely on people's physical presence? Schools are an important barometer because we have a lot more visibility into them than we do the private businesses that keep us supplied with food and fuel and medicine.
posted by wierdo at 10:09 PM on January 9, 2022 [15 favorites]
The Twitter thread isn't parodying parents, it's parodying politicians like Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott and astroturf organizations like Moms For Liberty and their ilk, whose members are storming school board meetings with equally idiotic arguments and threatening and doxxing the members of said boards on the rare occasion that they aren't actually committing the crime of terroristic threatening. This shit is about as authentic as the Brooks Brothers Riot of 2000.
Speaking to DetriusXii's point, the claim isn't that enough people will be permanently unable to work to cause catastrophic consequences, it's that enough people are falling ill at the same time that it's becoming nearly impossible for essential societal functions to be performed for a few weeks. We're closer to the tipping point between inconvenient intermittent shortages and complete, if temporary, supply chain breakdown for goods essential for sustaining life than almost anyone is willing to admit.
It's almost certain we will not reach that tipping point with Omicron thanks to vaccination, but it wouldn't have taken much for it to have gone the other way. If Omicron was as severe as Delta or if it was as good at escaping vaccination immunity as it is immunity acquired from previous infection, it very well could have gone the other way.
The evidence is right there in front of our faces. We've been discussing in this very thread how some school systems are being forced to close temporarily due to staff shortages and that a great many more are under such serious strain that they're basically only providing daycare at this point. Is it really so hard to see how the same thing could happen to other organizations that rely on people's physical presence? Schools are an important barometer because we have a lot more visibility into them than we do the private businesses that keep us supplied with food and fuel and medicine.
posted by wierdo at 10:09 PM on January 9, 2022 [15 favorites]
I'm sorry for needing to split this between posts, but I couldn't feasibly copy the contents of my links from where I was. The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia statement is fairly short and straightforward, so here it is:
The Headline:
Omicron Data Supports Resuming In-person Education in the New Year: A Statement from PolicyLab at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
The body:
Throughout the pandemic, PolicyLab at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia has carefully followed the emerging science on COVID-19 infection and offered guidance to schools throughout the region. With rising anxiety about the omicron variant that is swiftly moving across our communities, we affirm that in contrast to last year, when many community members were unvaccinated, this new variant has been milder than earlier COVID-19 strains for most children, and is occurring during a time when all K-12 students and their caregivers have been offered vaccination. The omicron variant is also particularly less virulent for those who have been vaccinated. We advise school leaders to consider this emerging data so that children can resume in-person education in the new year, so long as schools are able to staff their campuses for returning students. In the interim, we encourage staff who have not received boosters to obtain them, and for families who have not yet vaccinated their children to do the same.
Reposted CHOP link.
I don't read that as saying rather "do this so we can reopen schools". Rather, I read it as saying, "the data on Omicron indicates schools should remain open provided you have teachers and staff who aren't sick and/or in quarantine." Also, you should vaccinate your kids and staff should get boosters.
The American Association of Pediatrics guidance is somewhat longer, so I apologize for the length of the quotes:
Headline:
COVID-19 Guidance for Safe Schools and Promotion of In-Person Learning
Very First Paragraph in Large Print Text:
The AAP continues to strongly advocate that all policy considerations for school plans start with the goal of in-person learning. Strategies to reduce the risk of transmission of COVID-19 will keep students and staff safe and physically present in school.
First paragraphs in body:
The purpose of this guidance is to continue to support communities, local leadership in education and public health, and pediatricians collaborating with schools in creating policies for safe schools during the COVID-19 pandemic that foster the overall health of children, adolescents, educators, staff, and communities and are based on available evidence. There must be a continued focus on keeping students safe, particularly because not all students have had the opportunity or are eligible to be vaccinated against COVID-19 at this time. Evidence to support safe return to in-person learning continues to evolve. Remote learning – which exacerbated existing educational inequities - was detrimental to the educational attainment of students of all ages and worsened the growing mental health crisis among children and adolescents.1,2 Opening schools generally does not significantly increase community transmission, especially when guidance outlined by the World Health Organization (WHO),3 United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is followed.4,5 Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in schools can still occur. The risk may be greater for individuals and families who have chosen not to be vaccinated or are not eligible to be vaccinated.
During the surge of the more transmissible delta variant this summer and fall, in-school transmission has been observed more often in school districts that did not enact mask requirements. It is possible, with continued replication, that variants will emerge that are vaccine resistant and that may result in worsening illness. At this point in the pandemic, given what we know about low rates of in-school transmission when proper prevention measures are used, together with the availability of effective vaccines for those eligible, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) continues to believe that the benefits of in-person school outweigh the risks in almost all circumstances. This support for safe in-person learning is consistent with the original AAP COVID-19 school guidance released on June 24, 2020. Along with our colleagues in the field of education,6 the AAP strongly advocates for additional federal assistance to all schools throughout the United States as well as collaboration by school communities, families, students, and local, state, and federal officials to keep schools as safe as possible to promote in-person learning.
The rest of the guidance goes on to recommend pretty much what everyone is else recommends: mask, vaccinate, test, invest money in ventilation ect. Still, I don't read it as saying "do this so we can safely reopen schools." Rather, I read it as stating, "we need to safely re-open schools, here is how to do it given the evidence. It's true that it was last updated in November, and it looks like the news brief I found was from January 2021 (I'm an idiot who forgets the year), but I haven't seen, read, or heard anything indicating a change given the spread of Omicron. Rather, based on what I've heard through personal conversation, news interviews, and communications provided via both my local school system and my local teachers' union, the emphasis continues to be on keeping schools open with masking and testing (and obviously sufficient staff who aren't sick and/or in quarantine) because of the damage caused by disruptions to in-personal learning. Given the CHOP statement, I think its very unlikely there has been a change.
Also, there is this:
Officians Determined to Keep Schools Open Despite Omicron
I doubt politicians in "blue states" and the Secretary of Education would be trying to keep schools open if the pediatric profession were against it. That being said, if anyone can find an updated statement from AAP saying we should close schools because of Omicron (and not just that we shouldn't try to open schools that don't have enough staff because of quarantine and sickness), I'm certainly willing to revise my interpretation.
With this in mind, I do not see a problem with laughing along with a Twitter thread like this, which parodies views that may not be expressed very often here on MetaFilter, but are certainly expressed often in the larger population. Are those views representative of all parents who want to reopen schools? No, of course not, but they're nonetheless very prevalent in the conversation.
A little bit about me, so people can see where I am coming from. My job involves first hand contact with suffering amongst children and adolescents resulting from both the school shutdowns and the pandemic disruptions in general. I'm also regularly exposed to research documenting the impact of the school closures on students' academic and social-emotional growth. It's ugly.
On a more personal level, I was diagnosed as having mood disorders of various kinds when I was middle school. I've struggled with this condition my entire life. As a result, the mental health impacts of pandemic really hit home for me.
Last, I might very well have long COVID. Despite barely leaving house from early March to May of 2020, I experienced a severe pulmonary event in early April 2020. At the time it was recorded as a COVID case, but I now believe it was an asthma attack exacerbated by my inability to seek care due to hospital restrictions then in pace. I came to this determination after consultation with a pulmonologist. I'm about 70 percent sure it was asthma. I doubt I'll ever know for sure. Either way, the long term sequalae lasted off and on for about a year and a half. I'll never know for sure at this point.
Because of all that, for me, personally, I'm not a huge fan of the twitter post. It's not a laughing matter for me. Furthermore, I find the way the Twitter post flattens the debate to off-putting and counter-productive. Are there assholes who just won't vaccinate or mask and would rather follow Joe Rogan than a doctor because they are selfish and lazy? You bet. I know several. On the other hand, there are also people who have the difficult task of balancing considerations such as: closing schools will save X number of kids' lives by protecting them from catching COVID but cost Y number of kids' lives due to suicide, gun violence, and reduced educational attainment impacting their future ability to access the health care system. It's not an easy call to make, and treating it as such does the entire issue a disservice and poisons the well of a vital public discussion.
Believe me, if I could wave my magic wand, I'd build a global version of the NHS to vaccinate the entire world and overcome vaccine hesitancy. I'd also build and educational system and safety nets better able to withstand the shocks of lockdowns and keep kids safe when they are in school buildings. I hope to advance the world towards such a goal, as best I can, with my politics.
The Twitter thread isn't parodying parents, it's parodying politicians like Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott and astroturf organizations like Moms For Liberty and their ilk, whose members are storming school board meetings with equally idiotic arguments and threatening and doxxing the members of said boards on the rare occasion that they aren't actually committing the crime of terroristic threatening. This shit is about as authentic as the Brooks Brothers Riot of 2000.
Idiots drag you down to their level then beat you with experience. I believe that's the gist of the warning against arguing with them.
posted by eagles123 at 10:23 PM on January 9, 2022 [7 favorites]
The Headline:
Omicron Data Supports Resuming In-person Education in the New Year: A Statement from PolicyLab at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
The body:
Throughout the pandemic, PolicyLab at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia has carefully followed the emerging science on COVID-19 infection and offered guidance to schools throughout the region. With rising anxiety about the omicron variant that is swiftly moving across our communities, we affirm that in contrast to last year, when many community members were unvaccinated, this new variant has been milder than earlier COVID-19 strains for most children, and is occurring during a time when all K-12 students and their caregivers have been offered vaccination. The omicron variant is also particularly less virulent for those who have been vaccinated. We advise school leaders to consider this emerging data so that children can resume in-person education in the new year, so long as schools are able to staff their campuses for returning students. In the interim, we encourage staff who have not received boosters to obtain them, and for families who have not yet vaccinated their children to do the same.
Reposted CHOP link.
I don't read that as saying rather "do this so we can reopen schools". Rather, I read it as saying, "the data on Omicron indicates schools should remain open provided you have teachers and staff who aren't sick and/or in quarantine." Also, you should vaccinate your kids and staff should get boosters.
The American Association of Pediatrics guidance is somewhat longer, so I apologize for the length of the quotes:
Headline:
COVID-19 Guidance for Safe Schools and Promotion of In-Person Learning
Very First Paragraph in Large Print Text:
The AAP continues to strongly advocate that all policy considerations for school plans start with the goal of in-person learning. Strategies to reduce the risk of transmission of COVID-19 will keep students and staff safe and physically present in school.
First paragraphs in body:
The purpose of this guidance is to continue to support communities, local leadership in education and public health, and pediatricians collaborating with schools in creating policies for safe schools during the COVID-19 pandemic that foster the overall health of children, adolescents, educators, staff, and communities and are based on available evidence. There must be a continued focus on keeping students safe, particularly because not all students have had the opportunity or are eligible to be vaccinated against COVID-19 at this time. Evidence to support safe return to in-person learning continues to evolve. Remote learning – which exacerbated existing educational inequities - was detrimental to the educational attainment of students of all ages and worsened the growing mental health crisis among children and adolescents.1,2 Opening schools generally does not significantly increase community transmission, especially when guidance outlined by the World Health Organization (WHO),3 United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is followed.4,5 Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in schools can still occur. The risk may be greater for individuals and families who have chosen not to be vaccinated or are not eligible to be vaccinated.
During the surge of the more transmissible delta variant this summer and fall, in-school transmission has been observed more often in school districts that did not enact mask requirements. It is possible, with continued replication, that variants will emerge that are vaccine resistant and that may result in worsening illness. At this point in the pandemic, given what we know about low rates of in-school transmission when proper prevention measures are used, together with the availability of effective vaccines for those eligible, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) continues to believe that the benefits of in-person school outweigh the risks in almost all circumstances. This support for safe in-person learning is consistent with the original AAP COVID-19 school guidance released on June 24, 2020. Along with our colleagues in the field of education,6 the AAP strongly advocates for additional federal assistance to all schools throughout the United States as well as collaboration by school communities, families, students, and local, state, and federal officials to keep schools as safe as possible to promote in-person learning.
The rest of the guidance goes on to recommend pretty much what everyone is else recommends: mask, vaccinate, test, invest money in ventilation ect. Still, I don't read it as saying "do this so we can safely reopen schools." Rather, I read it as stating, "we need to safely re-open schools, here is how to do it given the evidence. It's true that it was last updated in November, and it looks like the news brief I found was from January 2021 (I'm an idiot who forgets the year), but I haven't seen, read, or heard anything indicating a change given the spread of Omicron. Rather, based on what I've heard through personal conversation, news interviews, and communications provided via both my local school system and my local teachers' union, the emphasis continues to be on keeping schools open with masking and testing (and obviously sufficient staff who aren't sick and/or in quarantine) because of the damage caused by disruptions to in-personal learning. Given the CHOP statement, I think its very unlikely there has been a change.
Also, there is this:
Officians Determined to Keep Schools Open Despite Omicron
I doubt politicians in "blue states" and the Secretary of Education would be trying to keep schools open if the pediatric profession were against it. That being said, if anyone can find an updated statement from AAP saying we should close schools because of Omicron (and not just that we shouldn't try to open schools that don't have enough staff because of quarantine and sickness), I'm certainly willing to revise my interpretation.
With this in mind, I do not see a problem with laughing along with a Twitter thread like this, which parodies views that may not be expressed very often here on MetaFilter, but are certainly expressed often in the larger population. Are those views representative of all parents who want to reopen schools? No, of course not, but they're nonetheless very prevalent in the conversation.
A little bit about me, so people can see where I am coming from. My job involves first hand contact with suffering amongst children and adolescents resulting from both the school shutdowns and the pandemic disruptions in general. I'm also regularly exposed to research documenting the impact of the school closures on students' academic and social-emotional growth. It's ugly.
On a more personal level, I was diagnosed as having mood disorders of various kinds when I was middle school. I've struggled with this condition my entire life. As a result, the mental health impacts of pandemic really hit home for me.
Last, I might very well have long COVID. Despite barely leaving house from early March to May of 2020, I experienced a severe pulmonary event in early April 2020. At the time it was recorded as a COVID case, but I now believe it was an asthma attack exacerbated by my inability to seek care due to hospital restrictions then in pace. I came to this determination after consultation with a pulmonologist. I'm about 70 percent sure it was asthma. I doubt I'll ever know for sure. Either way, the long term sequalae lasted off and on for about a year and a half. I'll never know for sure at this point.
Because of all that, for me, personally, I'm not a huge fan of the twitter post. It's not a laughing matter for me. Furthermore, I find the way the Twitter post flattens the debate to off-putting and counter-productive. Are there assholes who just won't vaccinate or mask and would rather follow Joe Rogan than a doctor because they are selfish and lazy? You bet. I know several. On the other hand, there are also people who have the difficult task of balancing considerations such as: closing schools will save X number of kids' lives by protecting them from catching COVID but cost Y number of kids' lives due to suicide, gun violence, and reduced educational attainment impacting their future ability to access the health care system. It's not an easy call to make, and treating it as such does the entire issue a disservice and poisons the well of a vital public discussion.
Believe me, if I could wave my magic wand, I'd build a global version of the NHS to vaccinate the entire world and overcome vaccine hesitancy. I'd also build and educational system and safety nets better able to withstand the shocks of lockdowns and keep kids safe when they are in school buildings. I hope to advance the world towards such a goal, as best I can, with my politics.
The Twitter thread isn't parodying parents, it's parodying politicians like Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott and astroturf organizations like Moms For Liberty and their ilk, whose members are storming school board meetings with equally idiotic arguments and threatening and doxxing the members of said boards on the rare occasion that they aren't actually committing the crime of terroristic threatening. This shit is about as authentic as the Brooks Brothers Riot of 2000.
Idiots drag you down to their level then beat you with experience. I believe that's the gist of the warning against arguing with them.
posted by eagles123 at 10:23 PM on January 9, 2022 [7 favorites]
I read the first paragraph and immediately thought of this.
Seems oddly appropriate.
On second thought, maybe not so oddly appropriate.
Original video for completeness sake.
posted by JustSayNoDawg at 10:55 PM on January 9, 2022
Seems oddly appropriate.
On second thought, maybe not so oddly appropriate.
Original video for completeness sake.
posted by JustSayNoDawg at 10:55 PM on January 9, 2022
My rage against my own government (Australia) is, we could see what was happening overseas. We had 2 years to figure this out.
And then on top of a bungled vaccine roll out, PCR system overload and now RAT shortages. GPs are cancelling vaccine appointments for 5-11 year-olds because they haven't received vaccine shipments (federal government responsibility.)
I'm currently pregnant, symptomatic, got a PCR today and told my results should be back in 7 days. In the mean time we wait. I wish I'd bought some RATs before Christmas and forgotten about them in the bottom of the drawer.
And yet we have to "push through" and take "personal responsibility". It's maddening. (Actual quotes by the way.)
posted by freethefeet at 10:59 PM on January 9, 2022 [13 favorites]
And then on top of a bungled vaccine roll out, PCR system overload and now RAT shortages. GPs are cancelling vaccine appointments for 5-11 year-olds because they haven't received vaccine shipments (federal government responsibility.)
I'm currently pregnant, symptomatic, got a PCR today and told my results should be back in 7 days. In the mean time we wait. I wish I'd bought some RATs before Christmas and forgotten about them in the bottom of the drawer.
And yet we have to "push through" and take "personal responsibility". It's maddening. (Actual quotes by the way.)
posted by freethefeet at 10:59 PM on January 9, 2022 [13 favorites]
Sorry, I got lost in rage frothing and forgot my point- yes I think schools should open safely, but heck the government could have done something a bit differently to get us ready for that.
posted by freethefeet at 11:01 PM on January 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by freethefeet at 11:01 PM on January 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
Crazy with stars, I'm not opposed to the people with various reasonable points about Covid concerns... But the people vehemently screaming that simple masking is equivalent to the deliberate horrific slaughter of millions of humans. That minimal precautions is somehow an intolerable infringement on their freedom. To me, it feels like those types are willing to sacrifice other people's lives and health for virtually nothing. At what point does doing everything in your power to avoid public health in a global pandemic turn to actual evil?
That's who I feel like that post is parodying. And sure, many people aren't remotely like that. But enough are willing to take staggering risks and actively fighting against public health that it's terrifying. Amplified by social media, sure. But does it feel like too many people are trying to drill holes in the boat I live in.
posted by Jacen at 2:38 AM on January 10, 2022 [9 favorites]
That's who I feel like that post is parodying. And sure, many people aren't remotely like that. But enough are willing to take staggering risks and actively fighting against public health that it's terrifying. Amplified by social media, sure. But does it feel like too many people are trying to drill holes in the boat I live in.
posted by Jacen at 2:38 AM on January 10, 2022 [9 favorites]
School systems have a bunch of different stakeholders with competing priorities. The intense pressures applied by Covid have exposed which stakeholders actually matter and I think it varies between different schools.
I think that in areas getting slammed by Omicron:
Schools run primarily for the benefit of children are operating remotely right now, as the health risks to students from catching Covid significantly outweigh the additional learning that is possible in person in understaffed classrooms with a lot of students out sick. They've also probably operating some mechanism to still get school food to poor students.
Schools run for the benefit of teachers are also remote for obvious reasons.
Schools run for the benefit of parents are operating in person, but have invested in mitigation strategies like improved ventilation and outdoor classrooms. They require masking, frequently test students, and enforce isolation periods. If Omicron cases continue to surge these schools will go remote once a critical mass of parents want them to. Usually these are rich private schools and public schools in rich areas.
Schools run for the benefit of employers will never go remote, haven't spent significantly on mitigation, and put limited effort into testing and isolating children. At best they'll attempt to enforce masks. If the situation gets bad enough that the teachers strike they'll be turned into glorified day care centers like in Chicago.
posted by zymil at 4:38 AM on January 10, 2022 [4 favorites]
I think that in areas getting slammed by Omicron:
Schools run primarily for the benefit of children are operating remotely right now, as the health risks to students from catching Covid significantly outweigh the additional learning that is possible in person in understaffed classrooms with a lot of students out sick. They've also probably operating some mechanism to still get school food to poor students.
Schools run for the benefit of teachers are also remote for obvious reasons.
Schools run for the benefit of parents are operating in person, but have invested in mitigation strategies like improved ventilation and outdoor classrooms. They require masking, frequently test students, and enforce isolation periods. If Omicron cases continue to surge these schools will go remote once a critical mass of parents want them to. Usually these are rich private schools and public schools in rich areas.
Schools run for the benefit of employers will never go remote, haven't spent significantly on mitigation, and put limited effort into testing and isolating children. At best they'll attempt to enforce masks. If the situation gets bad enough that the teachers strike they'll be turned into glorified day care centers like in Chicago.
posted by zymil at 4:38 AM on January 10, 2022 [4 favorites]
people vehemently screaming that simple masking is equivalent to the deliberate horrific slaughter of millions of humans. That minimal precautions is somehow an intolerable infringement on their freedom. To me, it feels like those types are willing to sacrifice other people's lives and health for virtually nothing. At what point does doing everything in your power to avoid public health in a global pandemic turn to actual evil?
Right? I think it's fine to have a more nuanced debate about school closings, but to come here and complain that this little bit of farce is poisoning the public dialogue seems to be missing the forest.
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 5:00 AM on January 10, 2022 [4 favorites]
Right? I think it's fine to have a more nuanced debate about school closings, but to come here and complain that this little bit of farce is poisoning the public dialogue seems to be missing the forest.
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 5:00 AM on January 10, 2022 [4 favorites]
I posted this in another thread, but this is crucial information for people who still see this simply as "teachers just don't want to work" or "this is all the unions' fault":
And let's be perfectly clear: Even the guidance in all those links from the UN and APA and whoever else that keep getting pointed out all makes it very clear that getting children back in schools is dependent on whether the staff and teachers are available. Omicron in the US is currently ripping through the populations with face-to-face jobs, which is why teachers' positivity rates and sickness are several times higher than the margins they've determined are safe. This is a public health issue, and no amount of shitty, uninformed Nate Silver tweets (pretty much all of them at this point) or WSJ op-eds from charter school CEOs can change that.
Trust me, teachers most likely want to be back in front of their kids. They just don't want schools to turn into a meatgrinder that possibly kills or permanently disables them and their loved ones because politicians want to make rich people richer.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 5:16 AM on January 10, 2022 [20 favorites]
In NYC, they're forcing symptomatic staff and teachers to come to work. In Chicago, the mayor went back on an agreement on the threshold of sick staff members (5% threshold, currently ~25% of staff have tested positive), and retaliated by cutting off all remote access for both staff AND students, even those with existing medical issues. The centrist and "moderate" liberal commentariat are calling on Biden to break teacher's union locals, an idea that is both monumentally sociopathic and depressingly possible given our current political situation.On the Chicago angle, there's also the distinct possibility that Mayor Lightfoot deliberately ignored or refused COVID assistance from the state, while she goes on MSNBC several times a day to lie about CTU to the rest of the country.
And let's be perfectly clear: Even the guidance in all those links from the UN and APA and whoever else that keep getting pointed out all makes it very clear that getting children back in schools is dependent on whether the staff and teachers are available. Omicron in the US is currently ripping through the populations with face-to-face jobs, which is why teachers' positivity rates and sickness are several times higher than the margins they've determined are safe. This is a public health issue, and no amount of shitty, uninformed Nate Silver tweets (pretty much all of them at this point) or WSJ op-eds from charter school CEOs can change that.
Trust me, teachers most likely want to be back in front of their kids. They just don't want schools to turn into a meatgrinder that possibly kills or permanently disables them and their loved ones because politicians want to make rich people richer.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 5:16 AM on January 10, 2022 [20 favorites]
Oh, and it's no longer just teachers and staff: Oakland students petition for school district to go to remote learning
“We are demanding KN95 masks for all of the students because they’re not easily accessible to them, twice a week PCR and rapid tests for everyone on campus and more outdoor spaces to eat safely when it rains or if the district doesn’t want to give this to us, we demand a shift to online learning,” said Ayleen Serrano who a 10th grader at MetWest High School in Oakland.posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 5:21 AM on January 10, 2022 [10 favorites]
Serrano is one of the organizers of this online petition that’s now gathered nearly 300 student signatures.
Serrano says she and her classmates began the petition after seeing increased COVID cases and a lack of available testing and resources.
Serrano says they’re sending this public petition to district leaders on Monday.
If their demands are not met by Monday the 17th, the students will not attend in-person classes for the remainder of that week until a planned strike outside the district’s office building on Friday the 21st.
The student petition follows a planned teacher “Sick out” on Friday where more than 500 teachers called out of work sick over similar concerns of rising cases and insufficient masks and available testing.
As a result, classes at 12 schools in the district were canceled.
In addition to some teachers not showing up to work over safety concerns, Serrano says some of her classmates have chosen to do the same and stay at home.
I personally think much of the drive to keep schools open no matter what is based on cold externalize-the-liabilities-logic. Kids get sick? It's up to families to deal with it. Teachers get sick? It's up to them to deal with it. At least the buildings are still open, so it's not our problem.
Yes, keeping schools closed causes different kinds of harm. But there are ways we can also mitigate that harm, just like we can mitigate the harm caused by covid by keeping schools closed. But paying parents to stay home, increasing options for counseling and mental health, renovating buildings for safer airflow, adding extra teaching options (community colleges already do a great job providing remedial courses--maybe we could provide everyone with free tuition post-pandemic? just sayin') all cost money, and that would require a sincere investment in social programs, and we don't seem to want to do that right now thankyouverymuchjoemanchin. So meat grinder it is!
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:29 AM on January 10, 2022 [12 favorites]
Yes, keeping schools closed causes different kinds of harm. But there are ways we can also mitigate that harm, just like we can mitigate the harm caused by covid by keeping schools closed. But paying parents to stay home, increasing options for counseling and mental health, renovating buildings for safer airflow, adding extra teaching options (community colleges already do a great job providing remedial courses--maybe we could provide everyone with free tuition post-pandemic? just sayin') all cost money, and that would require a sincere investment in social programs, and we don't seem to want to do that right now thankyouverymuchjoemanchin. So meat grinder it is!
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:29 AM on January 10, 2022 [12 favorites]
From a teachers' union in Seattle:
All schools are being impacted by the current Omicron wave. Nurses are overwhelmed & office staff can’t keep up with testing paperwork on top of their other duties. District can’t keep up contact tracing. Some schools are already in crisis mode due to staffing shortages. We believe the District is working hard to support our schools, but it is clear that something needs to give. The current wave of Omicron is making it increasingly difficult to meet students’ needs while keeping all of our classrooms and 104 buildings fully open.posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 5:41 AM on January 10, 2022 [2 favorites]
[The] District needs to be more transparent with community regarding their thinking and decision-making around what would cause a classroom or school to pivot to remote. Our Covid cases are off the charts. We are committed to keeping schools open for in-person learning to the greatest extent possible. At the same time, we’ve struggled enormously with staffing shortages all year, and we expect staffing issues to get even harder this month. We are hearing from our members, at least in certain schools, that both student and staff absences are getting in the way of teaching and learning. We have been asking the District to provide complete and transparent information to the community regarding daily absence rates. We are asking for daily reporting of student and staff absences by building and program, and including information around critical roles that are needed to keep buildings open and safe, such as nurses, special education staff, office professionals, and administrators. And, we’ve been calling upon the District to provide higher grade KN95 masks, additional Covid testing (without putting the burden of testing on already overworked staff), and workload relief, and to reprioritize the District's limited resources to address the current crisis.
Finally, we are hopeful that the current wave of cases will be relatively brief. We’re also hopeful that if a school needs to pivot to remote due to staffing shortages, that it would be very temporary & everyone is prepared. We know we can get through this if we work together.
According to a MD/PhD acquaintance of mine who works at a major university hospital, it's true that children seem to have the lowest symptoms, but they also have the highest viral load. (His hospital is suffering staffing issues and seems to be proceeding under the idea that Omicron will eventually infect them all and that the vaccines will protect them; they're no longer wearing N95's). He also says that for every twenty years of age, the risk of death increases a hundredfold. Therefore, it also seems to be true that having lots of children running around will result in teachers being infected and bringing it back to their families.
Added to that, the teachers I know have been overworked during the pandemic. Teacher pay has never recovered in this state since the 2008 recession, and our state was already losing teachers to neighboring states before the pandemic because of low pay. The pandemic has made the staffing situation worse, and now whenever a teacher is out sick, colleagues have to cover. This only makes the job more stressful, as remaining 'healthy' teachers have to scramble.
posted by Comrade_robot at 5:53 AM on January 10, 2022 [11 favorites]
Added to that, the teachers I know have been overworked during the pandemic. Teacher pay has never recovered in this state since the 2008 recession, and our state was already losing teachers to neighboring states before the pandemic because of low pay. The pandemic has made the staffing situation worse, and now whenever a teacher is out sick, colleagues have to cover. This only makes the job more stressful, as remaining 'healthy' teachers have to scramble.
posted by Comrade_robot at 5:53 AM on January 10, 2022 [11 favorites]
New York Times: Covid may raise the risk of diabetes in children, C.D.C. researchers reported.
Children who have recovered from Covid-19 appear to be at significantly increased risk of developing Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes, researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on Friday.posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 6:59 AM on January 10, 2022 [7 favorites]
A heightened risk of diabetes has already been seen among adults who recovered from Covid, according to some studies. Researchers in Europe have reported an increase in the number of children being diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes since the pandemic started.
But the C.D.C. study is among the first to examine large insurance claim databases in the United States to estimate the prevalence of new diabetes diagnoses in children under age 18 who had Covid or were known to be infected with the coronavirus.
The study used two claim databases from U.S. health plans to look at diabetes diagnoses made in youngsters under 18 over the course of a year or more, starting in March 1, 2020, comparing those who had Covid with those who did not.
Still, I don't read it as saying "do this so we can safely reopen schools." Rather, I read it as stating, "we need to safely re-open schools, here is how to do it given the evidence.
I don’t see those two viewpoints as being different. But you have clearly been considering this whole issue thoughtfully and in depth, so I’d like to understand your point - would you mind trying to explain a little more what you see as the distinction?
posted by eviemath at 7:14 AM on January 10, 2022
I don’t see those two viewpoints as being different. But you have clearly been considering this whole issue thoughtfully and in depth, so I’d like to understand your point - would you mind trying to explain a little more what you see as the distinction?
posted by eviemath at 7:14 AM on January 10, 2022
Having adults who can work from home do so even as others have been working in person throughout the pandemic has appreciably slowed rates of transmission. Why not have students who can safely stay home do so, so that schools can have smaller classroom bubbles/cohorts to more safely accommodate students who would experience much more adverse affects from not being in school? Or have kids attend regular outdoor field trips/learning activities some days while learning from home other days?
(I mean, I know why. It’s money and the ongoing underfunding of US schools. Similar to why we can’t have ventilation system upgrades in all schools even though that’s one of the major ways to remediate the effects of an airborne respiratory illness, or have school lunch programs do home delivery while schools are closed, or have the COVID benefit that made a huge difference to many families be ongoing, or have adequate mental health services just kind of in general, etc. But there are quite a variety of reasonable solutions and safer options in between fully at-home learning and re-opening schools with absolutely no safety measures.)
posted by eviemath at 7:22 AM on January 10, 2022 [8 favorites]
(I mean, I know why. It’s money and the ongoing underfunding of US schools. Similar to why we can’t have ventilation system upgrades in all schools even though that’s one of the major ways to remediate the effects of an airborne respiratory illness, or have school lunch programs do home delivery while schools are closed, or have the COVID benefit that made a huge difference to many families be ongoing, or have adequate mental health services just kind of in general, etc. But there are quite a variety of reasonable solutions and safer options in between fully at-home learning and re-opening schools with absolutely no safety measures.)
posted by eviemath at 7:22 AM on January 10, 2022 [8 favorites]
Our kid's suburban Chicago junior high returned to classes today after the holiday break.
We did not send our kid. We called in that they had some cold-like symptoms, holding them because of an abundance of caution, etc.
A close friend in the city only had to hold her kids out two days before the entire thing shut down due to massive numbers of cases. I'm expecting a similar outcome here. Even if they do manage to stay in class, I will feel more comfortable sending them after a couple of days of weeding out the first wave of sick kids.
I'm very fortunate to be able to do this, I realize.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:57 AM on January 10, 2022 [7 favorites]
We did not send our kid. We called in that they had some cold-like symptoms, holding them because of an abundance of caution, etc.
A close friend in the city only had to hold her kids out two days before the entire thing shut down due to massive numbers of cases. I'm expecting a similar outcome here. Even if they do manage to stay in class, I will feel more comfortable sending them after a couple of days of weeding out the first wave of sick kids.
I'm very fortunate to be able to do this, I realize.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:57 AM on January 10, 2022 [7 favorites]
Think about how the entire nation scrimped, scrapped and saved for World War II. The collective effort and sacrifice that was demanded of the people. The propaganda, the war bonds, the donation drives.
All of that could have been done in service of defeating Covid and educating our children. Stay out of the bars for the kids. Cancel major league sports for a year for the kids. Reorient manufacturing to churn out ventilation systems for the kids.
Nearly everyone agrees that in-person education is better. That's not really the question. The question is whether we're going to make in-person education safe and adequate.
Experts say, "Kids need to return to class, and to do it we need A, B, C, and X, Y, Z." A lot of folks hear only "kids need to return to class" and are happy to send them into the hotzone of infection.
It's the same as if your house burned down, and someone said, "you need a house, here's how you rebuild it." And then a bunch of gleeful commentators and politicians said, "you heard the expert, you need to return to your house!" They pat themselves on the backs for coming to their happy conclusion without providing you any support at all.
Knowing what needs to be done is NOT the same as actually having the resources to do it.
posted by explosion at 7:59 AM on January 10, 2022 [21 favorites]
All of that could have been done in service of defeating Covid and educating our children. Stay out of the bars for the kids. Cancel major league sports for a year for the kids. Reorient manufacturing to churn out ventilation systems for the kids.
Nearly everyone agrees that in-person education is better. That's not really the question. The question is whether we're going to make in-person education safe and adequate.
Experts say, "Kids need to return to class, and to do it we need A, B, C, and X, Y, Z." A lot of folks hear only "kids need to return to class" and are happy to send them into the hotzone of infection.
It's the same as if your house burned down, and someone said, "you need a house, here's how you rebuild it." And then a bunch of gleeful commentators and politicians said, "you heard the expert, you need to return to your house!" They pat themselves on the backs for coming to their happy conclusion without providing you any support at all.
Knowing what needs to be done is NOT the same as actually having the resources to do it.
posted by explosion at 7:59 AM on January 10, 2022 [21 favorites]
Mod note: One comment and a response to it deleted. Let's please reconsider whether our comments talking about other peoples' bodies are appropriate or even necessary.
posted by travelingthyme (staff) at 9:03 AM on January 10, 2022
posted by travelingthyme (staff) at 9:03 AM on January 10, 2022
Our kids are back at in-person school — we are lucky to live in an area where they are taking this seriously, so all kids and teachers are masked with surgical or N94, they practice distancing and staggered break times, and although there’s steady beat of absences among both kids and teachers things haven’t yet spiraled out of control — and I still want to cry when I think about how this is affecting them psychologically.
The other day I casually mentioned to one of them when our neighbors (in the before times) would visit and come into our house, and his eyes went wide in shock. I had a hard time holding it together in that moment. He’s really forgotten what “normal” life looks like.
I guess my point is that everything said in the analogy is totally correct — throwing kids into life rafts from a sinking ship would absolutely be a life-changing trauma, and nobody with a hint of conscience would propose that unless the alternative seemed even worse — and I fail to see how this analogy is either false or facetious.
posted by bjrubble at 9:25 AM on January 10, 2022 [7 favorites]
The other day I casually mentioned to one of them when our neighbors (in the before times) would visit and come into our house, and his eyes went wide in shock. I had a hard time holding it together in that moment. He’s really forgotten what “normal” life looks like.
I guess my point is that everything said in the analogy is totally correct — throwing kids into life rafts from a sinking ship would absolutely be a life-changing trauma, and nobody with a hint of conscience would propose that unless the alternative seemed even worse — and I fail to see how this analogy is either false or facetious.
posted by bjrubble at 9:25 AM on January 10, 2022 [7 favorites]
Why not have students who can safely stay home do so, so that schools can have smaller classroom bubbles/cohorts to more safely accommodate students who would experience much more adverse affects from not being in school?
Effective delivery of instruction is a complicated skill set that teachers can't just continually improvise, especially regarding modes of teaching. I had to mix online and in-person learning this past fall in a university setting, which was much easier with the student part of things because they're older, but it required bringing two very different modes of teaching into one stream, and I found it impossible to effectively deliver both simultaneously. Teaching in one mode, in one space, is hard enough, but juggling students both physically and virtually present, the variety of virtual settings from which students can work (allows some kinds of work but not others, varying by individual), multiple kinds of assessments, etc. etc., just multiplies workload exponentially. (For comparison, to properly convert a class I've taught in-person to an online version needs at least a few months of dedicated work before any first version is even rolled out to students, and is hopefully effective because it's a class designed to be offered online-only from the ground up.)
So, OK, let's try to make it easier on teachers and reorganize all student schedules according to in-person or virtual attendance, so individual teachers are only teaching in one mode. Even disregarding the enormous administrative work that entails (with what spare time?), now some teachers will have to move to online instruction with no preparation, so will simply be improvising day-to-day, likely only able to deliver minimally effective instruction despite best efforts--and that's assuming those teachers will have the equipment and other resources they need to teach online effectively. All teachers would have to deal with students being in new sections, which may or may not match the material of the section they left, etc. Also, nearly all teacher preparation work is uncompensated in the first place, done on our "own" time.
And so on. So many of the proposed (or imagined) solutions for how to make schools work right now are kind of from the outside-in, and teachers' needs--as usual--are taken for granted; even the most brilliant teacher cannot deliver effective instruction daily with no preparation, inadequate equipment, demands for multiple modalities, not to mention extraordinary personal risk during a pandemic. I don't have any solutions to offer; I am mostly sad that I live in a country that cares so little about people's lives that when our broken and poorly-supported schools can't be the parachute that we need, it means we're just going to smash into the ground instead because there is no emergency, back-up parachute. But teachers are not martyrs, this is just our job, and jobs are not worth our lives. (Though capitalism disagrees, as we are seeing, many many teachers are now saying this with their feet.)
Looking at the situation now, I see schools and school systems actively breaking, and there is no safety net here. The anger and blame-shifting will only get worse, because I don't see any actual solutions to our current collective needs being offered, only banging on the broken-down jalopy to please just get us down the road to the next exit so we can get to a gas station; but sometimes that old junker doesn't come through, doesn't start when you need it, and you have to walk those miles in the snowstorm to get to the gas station on your own. I am fearful and sad and angry for what that means for millions of Americans in a practical sense right now.
(And I apologize for the sort-of derail in this particular thread, but I'm just so angry at my country and culture, not just for right now, but for shitting on teachers and education as a profession my whole life. We are reaping what we have sown, and it fucking sucks.)
posted by LooseFilter at 9:40 AM on January 10, 2022 [13 favorites]
Effective delivery of instruction is a complicated skill set that teachers can't just continually improvise, especially regarding modes of teaching. I had to mix online and in-person learning this past fall in a university setting, which was much easier with the student part of things because they're older, but it required bringing two very different modes of teaching into one stream, and I found it impossible to effectively deliver both simultaneously. Teaching in one mode, in one space, is hard enough, but juggling students both physically and virtually present, the variety of virtual settings from which students can work (allows some kinds of work but not others, varying by individual), multiple kinds of assessments, etc. etc., just multiplies workload exponentially. (For comparison, to properly convert a class I've taught in-person to an online version needs at least a few months of dedicated work before any first version is even rolled out to students, and is hopefully effective because it's a class designed to be offered online-only from the ground up.)
So, OK, let's try to make it easier on teachers and reorganize all student schedules according to in-person or virtual attendance, so individual teachers are only teaching in one mode. Even disregarding the enormous administrative work that entails (with what spare time?), now some teachers will have to move to online instruction with no preparation, so will simply be improvising day-to-day, likely only able to deliver minimally effective instruction despite best efforts--and that's assuming those teachers will have the equipment and other resources they need to teach online effectively. All teachers would have to deal with students being in new sections, which may or may not match the material of the section they left, etc. Also, nearly all teacher preparation work is uncompensated in the first place, done on our "own" time.
And so on. So many of the proposed (or imagined) solutions for how to make schools work right now are kind of from the outside-in, and teachers' needs--as usual--are taken for granted; even the most brilliant teacher cannot deliver effective instruction daily with no preparation, inadequate equipment, demands for multiple modalities, not to mention extraordinary personal risk during a pandemic. I don't have any solutions to offer; I am mostly sad that I live in a country that cares so little about people's lives that when our broken and poorly-supported schools can't be the parachute that we need, it means we're just going to smash into the ground instead because there is no emergency, back-up parachute. But teachers are not martyrs, this is just our job, and jobs are not worth our lives. (Though capitalism disagrees, as we are seeing, many many teachers are now saying this with their feet.)
Looking at the situation now, I see schools and school systems actively breaking, and there is no safety net here. The anger and blame-shifting will only get worse, because I don't see any actual solutions to our current collective needs being offered, only banging on the broken-down jalopy to please just get us down the road to the next exit so we can get to a gas station; but sometimes that old junker doesn't come through, doesn't start when you need it, and you have to walk those miles in the snowstorm to get to the gas station on your own. I am fearful and sad and angry for what that means for millions of Americans in a practical sense right now.
(And I apologize for the sort-of derail in this particular thread, but I'm just so angry at my country and culture, not just for right now, but for shitting on teachers and education as a profession my whole life. We are reaping what we have sown, and it fucking sucks.)
posted by LooseFilter at 9:40 AM on January 10, 2022 [13 favorites]
Having adults who can work from home do so even as others have been working in person throughout the pandemic has appreciably slowed rates of transmission. Why not have students who can safely stay home do so, so that schools can have smaller classroom bubbles/cohorts to more safely accommodate students who would experience much more adverse affects from not being in school? Or have kids attend regular outdoor field trips/learning activities some days while learning from home other days?
The UK (education is devolved but in this regard all followed the same general policy) did this during the first lockdown. Children identified as being at risk or where both parents were essential workers were only out of in-person school for a very brief period.
posted by atrazine at 10:05 AM on January 10, 2022 [3 favorites]
The UK (education is devolved but in this regard all followed the same general policy) did this during the first lockdown. Children identified as being at risk or where both parents were essential workers were only out of in-person school for a very brief period.
posted by atrazine at 10:05 AM on January 10, 2022 [3 favorites]
LooseFilter, those are valid concerns, which I was perhaps too obliquely referring to in my second paragraph. Doing school well, safely, and flexibly during a pandemic requires more human resources (and more resources in general). It’s technically feasible, but practically speaking getting money for hiring more people and other increased resource expenditures is a major obstacle in the US.
posted by eviemath at 10:17 AM on January 10, 2022
posted by eviemath at 10:17 AM on January 10, 2022
The Folly of School Openings as a Zero-Sum Game — We need to address the needs of students—and parents, and teachers. One size does not fit all, and race complicates the challenge.
Instead of sophisticated thinking that starts with the fact that everyone is suffering, the current zero-sum paradigm plays up the suffering of children while the needs of adult parents, workers, and teachers are not a factor to consider. Ageism scholar Margaret Gullette posits that a major reason for the nation’s slow initial response to COVID-19 was because it was “only” older people who were dying at first in nursing homes. In the first half-year of the pandemic, 80 percent of COVID deaths were among people at least 65 years old.posted by tonycpsu at 7:54 AM on January 11, 2022 [7 favorites]
Though older people are now highly vaccinated, notable “breakthrough” COVID deaths have struck many elderly, such as the late military chief and secretary of state Colin Powell. Gullette contends that ageism, the last acceptable prejudice, occurs far earlier than age 65. That is certainly evident as teachers from their twenties to their sixties are up in arms in many cities about being pressured to go into densely packed, poorly ventilated classrooms without adequate safety protocols. Many of them have children and parents back home they do not want to infect. Yet former New York City mayor and media magnate Michael Bloomberg has said schools must be open “five days a week, no exceptions [my emphasis].”
Either/or thinking is also a hallmark of white supremacy culture, which maintains the status quo of those already privileged. It is curious to me that Leonhardt, Strain, Oster, and Bloomberg, none of whom are known as racial justice leaders, all now cite the disproportionate academic and social suffering of Black and Latino or low-income children as top reasons for in-person schooling, despite such disparities having been present historically. Nowhere in their arguments do they cite voices of color sharing their viewpoint. Also not evident are the voices of older people and those at high risk of exposure in their jobs.
I knew these Koch-funded bastard children of Randian business and Evangelicals at CNP were behind the Supreme Court fuckery, but I was unaware that they are also responsible for hydroxychloroquine, COVID denial in general, Moms for Liberty with their death threats against school boards, and January 6th.
posted by wierdo at 11:17 PM on January 11, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by wierdo at 11:17 PM on January 11, 2022 [2 favorites]
We had held our kid out for two days when in-person classes resumed. At this point, though, it does not seem to be a shitshow. So we'll be sending them back today. Wish us luck.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:47 AM on January 12, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:47 AM on January 12, 2022 [3 favorites]
I say this because of the vast numbers of children I have seen over the last two years admitted with what I will call sequelae of social isolation -- overdoses, eating disorders, suicide attempts, acute psychiatric decompensation, accidents related to intoxication, malnutrition, somatization syndromes, child endangerment and abuse -- far beyond what we have ever seen before, and rising and falling in waves clearly related to the closure and opening of the local school systems.
A new study says rates of hospitalization or emergency room visits for self-harm or overdose in Ontario among adolescents and young adults were down during the study (up to June of last year). This includes young adults up to 24, but the same result was found for youth 14-17. This is consistent with other studies that have found similar reductions.
I wonder if there might be some effect that fewer youth were presenting to emerg with injuries from car crashes, sports, etc. so the higher proportion of those with overdoses, self-harm, etc may make it appear that there were more overall, even if that wasn't the case.
posted by ssg at 6:59 PM on January 13, 2022 [2 favorites]
A new study says rates of hospitalization or emergency room visits for self-harm or overdose in Ontario among adolescents and young adults were down during the study (up to June of last year). This includes young adults up to 24, but the same result was found for youth 14-17. This is consistent with other studies that have found similar reductions.
I wonder if there might be some effect that fewer youth were presenting to emerg with injuries from car crashes, sports, etc. so the higher proportion of those with overdoses, self-harm, etc may make it appear that there were more overall, even if that wasn't the case.
posted by ssg at 6:59 PM on January 13, 2022 [2 favorites]
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posted by bonehead at 2:48 PM on January 9, 2022 [5 favorites]