1/ Unlike Omicron wave, the BA.2 & BA.2.12.1 surge has produced a sustained high level of illness impacting @APSVirginia in May, especially as the system reduced isolation and guaranteed that identified contagious people would return to infect others.
2/ North Arlington schools saw largest % of their student bodies infected w/COVID. (CDC estimates actual cases 2.3x-9x higher than reported in VA, so these are undercounts.)
5/ The size and scale of outbreaks linked undeniably to spread at school has increased dramatically during this surge, with huge outbreaks in April and May.
6/ We shouldn't have to consent to have our kids, families, or ourselves, infected with COVID-19 multiple times next year, with new variants — just to access a public education.
No virtual option either in fall, for most medically fragile families.
7/ We actually never expected to have such a high level of COVID-19 within our schools.
And without grant funding and leadership for many things, we expect to see a much worse 2022-23 year, although it may not be documented as well.
@APSVirginia To clarify, w/Omicron, it was an outrageously high spike — then came down rapidly (we masked at school). With current surges, we've had as much illness, just spread out as wave after wave of students and teachers infects the next. APS did not use effective protocols to stop it.
1/ ASHRAE (professional engineering org for HVAC professionals) has a technical committee on the design of educational facilities that has released new guidance on how schools can achieve “advanced indoor air quality.” @SuptDuran@jmayo443@APSFacilities
2/ The complete report can be found here, but a 🧵 to sum up some of the ideas. APS falls very short on most of this, but its our hope that new buildings will be built with some basis of best practice and health — optimal conditions for learning. ashrae.org/file%20library…
3/ First, verify, test, and balance HVAC systems, including direct measurements from at least 10% of classrooms, at a minimum.
MINIMAL testing should include CO2 levels are being maintained at <750 ppm over outdoor air. Also levels for PM2.5 and toxic volatile organic compounds.
Covid can cause damage to the heart on a cellular level that can lead to lasting problems, including irregular heartbeats & heart failure, new research suggests.
And the plan is? 5-10 infections for every kid in their school years? Brilliant, @SuptDuran.
Today, APS has 9,862 cases of COVID on dashboard, @SuptDuran. We counted at least 115 cases pre-dashboard. Looks like +23 more and APS hits the 10,000 mark. Massive waves happened when masks came off. APS lacks impactful air cleaning to prevent damage to health of kids/staff.
Saying you did something, and checking a box, is not the same thing as actually doing it well, @SuptDuran. Times have changed. Masks are off a lot of kids. You need more clean air. Take off the blindfold and do something about it.
1/ Finally got the full pandemic data file via a FOIA request from #Arlington Public Schools. What follows is a historic account of how the pandemic went in the smallest "self-governing" county in the USA; also one of the wealthiest (7th) and most densely populated (12th).
2/ COVID continues to be a significant, systemic challenge that impacts schools, teachers, kids and their families — as well as education. Data can inform policies to implement for the long run to disrupt COVID & other airborne illnesses.
3/ Data that follows is from APS. Notes: APS stats lack cases from fall 2020, before the Qualtrics system (+100 cases?) Also, APS continuously updates/deletes double records. (Likely +/- 20 records out of more than 9,000 cases in our file.)
@sri_srikrishna@RanuDhillon@AbraarKaran We’re re-running our spreadsheet of all classrooms in Arlington, where staff accepted 4 ACH and we had 7,000+ cases of COVID. They remind everyone how Dr. Allen blessed their 4 ACH when we ask for better. Nothing has been more detrimental to our efforts to get more clean air.
@sri_srikrishna@RanuDhillon@AbraarKaran We do want to see how many classrooms have 10 L/s/person of clean air, based on last year’s enrollment, and what the size of the gap is, if measured that way, especially with more crowded schools. The Italian study suggested up to 14 L/s/person.
@sri_srikrishna@RanuDhillon@AbraarKaran Sadly, these are numbers on paper. Systems ARE NOT functioning like building plans promised as long ago as 2002!!! We don’t don’t really trust these numbers. There’s no budget to measure or track real world performance. Now we have ionizers in rooms, generating who knows what.
1/ Falls Church has the least amount of poverty of all VA localities. Wealthier suburban families with access to healthcare are weathering #COVID19 better than others. From a glance, #SOL slump seems to have struck hard at poorest counties with highest per capita rates of COVID.
2/ We would like to see this state invest a lot more in correcting decades of deferred maintenance that make our schools an ideal setting to spread COVID-19 (and a less than ideal setting for learning and health). Our schools facilities should be a lot more pandemic resilient.
3/ The pandemic is THE problem. More kids miss more days of school in districts with less health protections. More sickness and and cognitive impairment is not good. Youngkin ordered schools to let #COVID rip in spring, now blames schools for damage HE CAUSED through SOL season.
1/ A CDC reorganization will not fix this, if the CDC does not base its guidance on science.
CDC failed early to communicate #COVIDIsAirborne and discouraged mask use — to date the most effective & cheap strategy. (Different from other countries w/better response.)