Coronavirus spreads in schools, but no one keeps track of all outbreaks

Cases of the coronavirus are already surfacing in K-12 schools that have reopened, but the federal government is not tracking these outbreaks, and some states are not reporting them publicly, making it more difficult to determine how the virus is spreading, say the experts.

Dozens of students and staff have been quarantined due to potential exposure to COVID-19 in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Indiana, among other states.

But there is no official national tally of school-related COVID-19 cases, and some states are not reporting the number of outbreaks or the number of students and staff infected. Instead, they leave it to local authorities to decide what information to make public and what information to share more closely with the students and families concerned. Researchers say the lack of full accounting is hampering efforts to identify safety practices that can best prevent the spread of cases in schools.

“Without good data that tracks cases over time – and shows how one case turns into many cases – there’s just no way to answer that question,” said Emily Oster, economist at the Brown University and co-founder of COVID Explained, a team of researchers studying the pandemic. “In January, we will be in the same situation as we are now, and the children will still not be in school.”

At least nine states – including Alabama, California and Pennsylvania – are tracking school-related coronavirus cases and outbreaks, but will not make this data public, according to an NBC News tally of the 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Many of these states have raised privacy concerns for data retention. Some have claimed that data on coronaviruses in schools is not essential to protect the general public, and said their policies may change in the future if there is a clear public health reason for providing this information. .

At least 15 other states have started or have committed to releasing data on school-based outbreaks, according to the NBC News survey. Seven states said they were still deliberating on their plans, and the rest did not respond to a request for comment.

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Even among states that have committed to sharing data, there are major gaps and inconsistencies in reporting policies. Each state defines its own definition of an “outbreak” – usually a number of cases linked to a single site. Most said they would not specify which district or school was affected, citing privacy concerns. And only a handful of states have said they will release the actual number of students and staff infected.

A spokeswoman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the agency was not tracking COVID-19 cases in schools and the education department had not responded to a request for comment.

Beyond the concerns of researchers, educators and parents are worried about whether they will be notified of positive cases that could threaten their safety – not only in their schools, but in neighboring areas as well. School administrators fear that the lack of complete data could fuel an unnecessary panic by making it difficult to determine whether a report on an individual school epidemic is an outlier or a sign of imminent danger.

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, called on all states to collect and publish this data because the federal government does not.

“The Trump administration has shamefully tried to keep America in the dark over COVID-19, so it’s doubly important that states ignore political bluster and commit to providing the truth about the spread of the virus,” said Weingarten in a statement in response to NBC News Results. “As some school districts do their best to educate teachers, families, and children, we hope states will accept the program and provide the transparency they deserve as schools gradually begin to reopen.

In the absence of complete state or federal data, some researchers step in to collect information themselves.

Oster, the Brown University economist, is working with the School Superintendents Association, which represents school officials, to develop a dashboard that collects the latest information directly from individual districts to help educate administrators and academics. This would include not only the number of positive cases in schools, but also the size of the student body, the number of students and staff in quarantine at any given time, and the evolution of cases over time.

The goal is to track infections, and also to quickly discern which regions and schools are most effective at preventing and containing outbreaks and whether their safety procedures are responsible for the difference. Such information could also help parents decide whether to send their children to school or keep them at home for distance learning, Oster said.

“The only evidence that will be really informative is what happens when we open schools,” she says. “Whether it’s the right decision or not, once the schools are open, it would be a shame not to take the opportunity to learn how to do this.”

Other institutions are also trying to fill in the gaps with their own reports. The Indianapolis Star launched a searchable database of positive cases in schools after the state government began the school year without making the information public. (The Indiana Department of Health said it was working on a public dashboard for school-related cases, but did not provide a timeline or details of what data to include.)

A Kansas teacher even created a Google spreadsheet for educators and parents to track case information and school quarantines.

While other countries have reopened schools earlier and more widely than the United States, they have also not comprehensively tracked cases and epidemics in children, making it more difficult to offer advice to schools in the United States, said Annette C. Anderson, assistant and assistant professor. director of the Center for Safe and Healthy Schools at Johns Hopkins University. International studies into the spread of COVID-19 in classrooms have been of limited scope, typically in countries where the pandemic has been less widespread than in the United States.

“We are only beginning to understand the transmission of COVID among children,” Anderson said. “It’s important for us to have good data assembly.”

According to Anderson, researchers struggled to find data on children that used consistent standards. A recent American Academy of Pediatrics study on childhood infections noted that states often define “children” differently in their follow-up, with some listing, for example, all people under the age of 14, and others setting the cutoff. as high as 20.

This lack of granular information can be of great significance, as one question scientists urgently hope to resolve is the extent to which younger and older children are affected differently by the virus.

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Without a more comprehensive overview of cases across the country, researchers say it’s difficult to know what to do with individual outbreaks. In northern Alabama, local media reported four cases of coronavirus in the Morgan County school system last week, prompting 25 students and staff to be quarantined.

A spokeswoman for Morgan County Schools said she could not provide more details on where the cases occurred, or whether it was students or teachers who were infected. County and state health departments declined to release further information.

“The Alabama Department of Public Health and its local county health departments do not release information relating to reportable disease investigations for reasons of policy and privacy,” said Dr. Karen Landers , deputy public health manager for the Alabama Department of Health. E-mail.

In comparison, Cherokee County in Georgia provides regular updates on the number of staff and students who have tested positive and the name of their school, as well as the number in quarantine due to a potential exposure. County schools have 120 active coronavirus cases among students and staff, according to the latest report released Friday, and more than 1,100 have been quarantined since the county’s schools reopened on August 3.

But the school district stressed that these reports were voluntary. “It should be noted that this level of public reporting is by no means required, but is in keeping with our long-standing commitment to transparency,” wrote Barbara Jacoby, spokesperson for the School District of Canada. Cherokee County, in an email.

Danny Carlson, director of policy and advocacy at the National Association of Elementary School Principals, said he heard from principals who wanted to see national data on whether outbreaks like the one in Cherokee County were anomalies.

“It’s really difficult otherwise, because let’s take the example of Georgia – is it noise? Is it a one-off thing? Is it because of the mask requirements? Carlson said. “I think people are confused – they want to know if it’s a trend or not.”