Thread by @smartrestartaps

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.

#CovidIsntOver #COVIDIsAirborne

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.)

APS data: tinyurl.com/APSVADashboard.

4/ Here's how @APSVirginia has gotten to more than 9,000 cases, along with dates of policy choices, among them:
❌ Failure to promote masks at height of BA.2 & BA.5 surges
❌ Cut isolation to 5 days (first staff, then kids); allow infectious people to return w/o negative test

5/ We looked at both buildings & programs. Buildings w/most cases:
#Wakefield
#Yorktown
#WashingtonLiberty
#Williamsburg
#Gunston
#Discovery (newer bldg)
#ArlingtonTraditional
#Cardinal (new)

6 of 7 in affluent N. Arlington
3 had $$ HVAC work that failed to get rooms up to code

6/ We mapped elementary schools in comparison to each other.

#Discovery, #Cardinal, and #Taylor were well above peers during the May "You do you" BA.2 wave.

Anecdotally, after spring break, mask use dropped the most here. VDH listed outbreaks, confirmed 100s of linked cases.

7/ We mapped high schools and middle schools as well. Look at the impact of impact of community behavior in this graph. During the first wave of Omicron, prevalence in high schools & middle schools is similar. Thousands got sick here over winter break while schools were closed.

8/ But during the "You do you" BA.2 wave, #Yorktown is well above its peer schools. And so is #Williamsburg.

So what was different? Teachers & students told us mask wearing, but it's "anecdata." (Hopefully, admins were not laxer about asking coughing, sick students to go home.)

9/ So essentially, APS schools tracked more closely together during Omicron (when masking was uniform policy) and then there is a major variance when it was "you do you."

System wide, it looks like this, comparing 16 weeks at the start of school last year to this year.

10/ Here's what it looks like, assessing cases from after Virginia's March 1st edict that removed universal mask protections in schools. APS capitulated, sent out a note "masks were optional." Some communities were much slower than others to unmask. Some kids/staff still masking.

11/ +2,000 cases of COVID-19 among all our teachers and staff; some got Long COVID; some decided to quit. This much sickness cannot be good for any workforce.

APS needs strong sick leave policies for all and should cover COVID time off. Or hey, #DoBetterAPS to prevent illness!

12/ Nearly 7,000 student COVID cases now, and counting.

Remember data = confirmed cases, not the true burden, which could be undercounted by 10x or more.

Low income schools may have some degree of undercount due to less access to stuff like $24 rapid antigen tests.

13/ Here's the best breakdown we could do on the grades. Roughly a quarter of ALL students in grades first through fifth grade had COVID last year. The numbers were closer to a fifth for older grades. (We could speculate why.)

Please remember: stats are a big undercount.

14/ Wanted to create a graphic on health equity, but APS only has racial/ethnic data for about 1 of 5 COVID cases. So as far as analyzing the impact of COVID on Black, indigenous, Latino, Asian, and other minority communities, much data just wasn't collected.

15/ Let's look at pay grades. Teachers & assistants have a shocking case count. But it's the lack of cases in some areas (cafeteria?) that's alarming — can workers not take time off if sick? Do bosses tell bus drivers to work sick? APS needs adequate leave, including COVID+ days.

15.5/ There will be lower rates of COVID at school, if APS helps sick/infectious to stay home; gives people sick days to get vaccinated. APS needs to hire more relief workers to cover for the sick; since it looks like 1,000+ staff COVID cases/year will happen w/o better policies.

16/ Contact tracing. APS largely abandoned telling kids when classmates had exposed them to COVID-19 during the May 2022 "You do you" wave. This left kids to DIY outbreak management. (Who was absent in class today?)

Why not tell a class about a COVID case? Like we do w/ lice?

17/ When you know you were exposed, you can watch for symptoms, get tested.

APS data indicate 31% of staff/32% of kids did NOT have symptoms at the point tested positive.

Data supports sending symptomatic kids home, providing testing access, and communicating about exposures.

APS collected data on what symptoms students & staff had.This graph shows JUST this year (2022) as Omicron and subvariants BA.2 and BA.5, circulated. Coughing, congestion, and fatigue were common. Case notes suggested >40 APS families got diagnosed/treated at a hospital. 😭

18/ Sports: Many pairs/trios of cases on teams on same days. Haven't made a fancy graph, but here are cases by sport. Many sports teams had case clusters. (Et tu H-B ultimate frisbee?)

Biggest clusters:
#WashingtonLiberty boy's basketball (Dec. superspreader)
#Wakefield football

19/ Coaches can instill in players concern for others, a "take care of our team health" mentality; ask sick kids to stay home/get tested.

Unfortunately, we know of a hospitalization after illness on a team. (Influenza is out there, too.)

"Play healthy" should be a policy push.

20/ About those buses... There is often COVID-19 riding them. Feel really bad for our bus drivers and attendants who are exposed continuously to germs in their air; but not provided with GOOD masks in a variety of styles.

Rolling down those bus windows seems pretty smart.

21/ Took a look at how often a COVID+ kid was on a morning bus route during the first two months of this school year. The answer was about 27% of the time, based on reported cases.

Roll down the windows. Mask up on the bus.

22/ APS collected data about prevalence of infectious kids/staff at school:

In 2022:

3,203 students, 717 employees were on campus (& bus) in 48 hours before testing + for COVID.

At least 529 kids, 152 staff members were likely contagious. (On campus AFTER taking the + test.)

23/ Taking a moment to ask @BethanyZSutton, @cdiaztorres240, @PriddyAPS, @MaryKaderaAPS, and @ReidForSchools to get serious about cleaning up the air in our schools; disrupting COVID, flu, RSV, etc.

Hot take: 1,000+ sick staff & 3,000+ sick kids annually will burden this system.

24/ Can you spot the schools having outbreaks of COVID-19?

This is a data table snapshot by week for last school year, and this year, set up by program — not building.

25/ A comparison of what % of a school got sick, per confirmed/reported cases in Arlington Public Schools. (Search #cases, #Arlington, #COVID19 in our feed for past updates.)

#Discovery elementary had the most kids infected in a school program in APS last year. Then #Taylor.

26/ This shows the % of a school's student body getting sick in the same week of a school year, from COVID-19, in @APSVirginia.

Can you spot the outbreaks? #ArlingtonCareerCenter shows up with a very high % of students infected already this year. Followed by #Tuckahoe, #Cardinal

27/ Take a look at each APS school and grade. Can you spot the clusters of COVID-19? Some schools implemented outdoor lunch this year, as BA.5 spread. Others didn't. Some admins encourage masking. Others started the year w/indoor staff meals and looked askance at one-way maskers.

28/ The graphs show COVID spread in APS with the new variant waves, which arrived as:
- all returned from summer
- during teacher in-service week if not handled thoughtfully
- after Thanksgiving
- after winter break
- after spring break

- also, event superspreaders (#Wakefield)

29/ Fact-based solutions to disrupt COVID (flu, RSV, etc.) include:
✔️monitoring classroom CO2, prioritizing worst rooms for fixes
✔️HEPA & DIY filter boxes in classrooms; what's needed is 6-12 ACH of clean air JUST from filters
✔️providing hi-fi masks in variety of styles, sizes

30/ and...
✔️encouraging masking, especially amid a school outbreak
✔️communicating class exposures
✔️increasing access & use of testing
✔️requiring sick people to test negative before return
✔️paid COVID sick leave so infectious stay home
✔️vaccine clinics at school (flu, too!)

31/
✔️"play healthy" culture in sports
✔️requiring open bus windows
✔️improving outdoor spaces
✔️outdoor lunch (plan to install gUV in cafeterias)
✔️sending sick kids home, giving 2 tests to use 48 hours apart
✔️test to return after breaks
✔️budget major $ to double ventilation

32/ Here's one last final in-depth look at how outbreaks unfolded at three North Arlington schools that had such a high % of their student bodies get COVID-19. This shows by grade, and ALSO includes teacher cases and sports cases. #Discovery #Cardinal #Yorktown

33/ Picked #Cardinal (☝️📈) since it shows APS is NOT designing new schools w/enough clean air. Far from it. (ASHRAE is drafting higher code standards now.)
APS shouldn't waste >$200-million on an ACC campus that contributes to sickness. Double the ventilation plan & use MERV-13.

@threadreaderapp unroll

* 6 of 8; sorry for typo. We did use the old $2/month Twitter Blue service because it allowed edit on Tweets; loved daily article round-up where we could read top studies/articles curated by 100 trusted scientists. Not paying for new version due to current Twitter snafu.

FYI @JuliaRaifman