Highest Risk

It's behind a firewall, but the New York Times has an article from yesterday pretty much saying "JESUS, THE SCHOOLS ARE THE HIGHEST RISK FACTOR IN GETTING COVID, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T REOPEN THEM."

If we can quote from the CNN article that quotes the Times (written for CNN by Veronica Stracqualursi):

Internal documents from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that fully reopening K-12 schools and universities would be the "highest risk" for the spread of coronavirus, according to a New York Times report, as President Donald Trump and his administration push for students and teachers to return in-person to classrooms.

The 69-page document obtained by the Times marked "For Internal Use Only" was among materials for federal public health response teams deployed to coronavirus hotspots to help local public health officials handle the outbreak, the newspaper reported.

The document was circulated this week, the Times reported, as Trump slammed the CDC guidelines around reopening schools and he, Vice President Mike Pence and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos increased their pressure on schools to fully reopen by the fall.

It is unclear whether the President viewed the CDC document, according to the Times.

This is, again, why we shouldn't elect to the White House a bankrupt moronic con artist who refuses to read. Back to the article:

The document, mostly comprised of CDC documents already publicly available, mentions reopening plans from states, districts, and individual schools and universities, identifying some proposals as consistent with CDC guidance and criticizing the "noticeable gaps" in other plans, the Times reported.

Not every state is ready to re-open anything (cough, Florida, cough, and for 2,000 of us a day THIS IS NOT A JOKE). As I've blogged earlier and as others are blogging (and screaming), our schools are a gathering place of far too many humans into far too many indoor locations incapable of social distancing nor keeping everything sanitized.

You think bars and restaurants and Disney theme parks are super spreaders? Your local middle school will be just as effective in spreading COVID, and in a more horrifying way.

Jesus, America.

Reopening the schools right now is a bad idea.