The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) endorsed “test-to-stay” policies when it comes to dealing with student COVID-19 cases in schools. The video above shows CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky discuss “test-to-stay” at Friday’s White House Coronavirus Response Task Force briefing. The CDC’s official guidance has been that when someone in a school tests positive for COVID-19 infection, those who had close contact with that person should quarantine at home for 10 days. The “test-to-stay” policies allow close contacts to remain in classrooms if they test negative.
“Test-to-stay is an encouraging public health practice to help keep our children in school,” said CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky on Friday.
The policy is already being used by many school districts covering hundreds of schools. Several states have even funded statewide test-to-stay policies. The CDC had previously said there is promise in the approach, as long as other measures such as masking for both teachers and students were followed.
“Test-to-Stay is another valuable tool in a layered prevention strategy that includes promoting vaccination of eligible students and staff, requiring everyone age 2 and older wear a mask inside schools and facilities, keeping at least 3 feet of distance between students, screening testing, ventilation, hand washing, and staying home when sick,” the CDC said in a Friday news release.
The CDC has been working with some school districts to evaluate these “test-to-stay” policies. Friday’s announcement came alongside two reports published by the CDC in the “Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report”. The first one looked at Los Angeles County Public Schools from Aug. 15-Oct. 31.
“One in five LAC public schools adopted TTS,” the CDC wrote in the report. “In TTS schools, student case rates did not increase, and tertiary transmission was not identified.” The other report looked at schools in Lake County, Illinois, a suburban community just north of Chicago.
“Secondary transmission among TTS participants was 1.5%; no tertiary transmission was observed among school-based contacts; however, tertiary cases were identified among household contacts,” the CDC said in the Illinois report. “Implementation of TTS preserved up to 8,152 in-person learning days.”
