Do not open school

Although I have been retired from our school system for nearly 20 years, I still live in Gettysburg and pay taxes to the school district. As a member of our tax base, I feel I need to state my feelings about school opening.

After reading the July 30, 2020 New York Times’ article on the coronavirus outbreak, I feel compelled to bring it to your attention. Essentially, the article says that infected children— small children— have at least as much of the virus in their noses and throats as infected adults. Indeed, children younger than age 5 may host up to 100 times as much of the virus in the upper respiratory tract as adults. This is from a study that was led by Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and published in JAMA Pediatrics.

Part of the article:

“But one takeaway from this is that we can’t assume that just because kids aren’t getting sick, or very sick, that they don’t have the virus.”

The study is not without caveats: It was small, and did not specify the participants’ race or sex, or whether they had underlying conditions. The tests looked for viral RNA, genetic pieces of the coronavirus, rather than the live virus itself. (Its genetic material is RNA, not DNA.)

Still, experts were alarmed to learn that young children may carry significant amounts of the coronavirus.

“I’ve heard lots of people saying, ‘Well, kids aren’t susceptible, kids don’t get infected.’ And this clearly shows that’s not true,” said Stacey Schultz-Cherry, a virologist at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

“I think this is an important, really important, first step in understanding the role that kids are playing in transmission.”

Do not open school this fall. Our children are not disposable items; they’re the seeds to our future.

If we open school, they will come. Let’s not give them that option.

So it’s up to us: Do not open school. Wait until the numbers are at zero for a week or so. Then wait another week. Then ask the teachers if they are comfortable with teaching children who still might be contagious. Take their answers seriously.

Judith S. Pyle,
Gettysburg