DCPS moves away from contact tracing for elementary schools

JACKSONVILLE, Florida. – Saying health officials can’t track contact tracing, Duval County Public Schools announced Friday it’s turning to new ways to notify parents of COVID-19 cases in schools elementary.

In a blog post, the school district said it was introducing two strategies to keep parents of elementary school students up to date: sending letters home when there is a positive case in a classroom and passing courses to e-learning if there are two or more cases in a class within a seven-day period.

The new strategies will go into effect no later than Wednesday, the district said. They will remain in place until mid-September, when the district will determine whether the health department can help with contact tracing efforts.

“These steps are necessary because the Department of Health has not been able to keep pace with the contact tracing workload since the school began,” the post said. “Under state law, the Florida Department of Health has the responsibility to confirm the positive case, conduct contact tracing and case investigation, and notify families who are affected.”

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If a classroom transitions to online learning, the district expects it to take two to seven days.

Right after the announcement, News4Jax spoke with Alyssa Key. She is a mother of elementary school children and founder of a local online support group for parents called “Momtourage”. More than 3,500 moms are members of the group and according to Key, all moms are concerned about protecting their children from COVID-19. Key says this new plan may not be enough to protect children from a COVID outbreak.

“It seems a little worrying that it takes two students to issue any type of stay-at-home warrant. Probably an unpopular opinion, but it seems that if a child in a class comes down with COVID and letters are sent home, parents should be given the option to log in immediately. But, it also seems like it should be mandatory,” she said.

Key says this is yet another example of why children who are too young to get vaccinated should wear masks at school to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

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The school district said it is taking these measures in elementary schools, their students, many of whom are under the age of 12, are not currently eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.

The decision was announced the same day Florida surpassed 3 million COVID-19 cases. Of the 150,118 new cases reported last week, 20,331 were in children under the age of 12.

The district has reported 589 presumptive positive cases of COVID-19 since the start of the school year, resulting in the quarantine of 189 students and adults for students and staff who have been in close contact with infected individuals. .

According to the blog, the health department told the district that it had assigned more staff to school cases, but was unable to track the number of reported cases in a timely manner due to the “rapidly spreading nature” of the delta. variant.

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Due to the high level of transmission in Jacksonville, the district recommends that parents take these steps to protect their families:

• Pay close attention to your child’s symptoms of COVID-19. These symptoms may include fever, cough, sore throat, difficulty breathing, vomiting, diarrhea, new loss of taste or smell, fatigue, and headache. If you see any signs of these symptoms, we recommend that your child skip school and get tested and see a doctor immediately.

• Wear a face covering around other people at school or elsewhere.

• Avoid close contact with others whenever possible, especially with friends and family at increased risk of severe illness from COVID-19.

• Remind your child to wash their hands and use the available hand sanitizer frequently.

• If you and your child (aged 12 and over) have not been vaccinated, please consider getting it as soon as possible. See www.duvalschools.org/vax for information on COVID-19 vaccine events.