Students can stay in school despite Ada County’s rising COVID-19 numbers. Here’s why.
Children can remain in school even when Ada County falls into the highest level of community spread, Central District Health clarified Friday.
That will likely come Tuesday as coronavirus cases surge in the Boise area. But the health district will not require, or even recommend, that students return to full online learning.
The update represents a reversal from previous advice to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Idaho’s back-to-school plan, released in July, recommended schools move fully online when in the red category. But Central District Health said it has found little evidence schools are contributing to Ada County’s rising case counts or having an effect on hospitalizations.
“Our main goal in all of this is to reduce the spread and slow the spread,” Gina Pannell, a health district school liaison, told the Boise School Board on Friday. “If schools are not contributing to that, there’s not an indication anything needs to be done differently at this point in time.”
Pannell said the health district will update its guidance as it learns more about the virus. But she cautioned if schools become a source of spread, Central District Health could change its advice again and recommend closing school buildings.
The new guidance affects Idaho’s two largest school districts — West Ada (40,000 students) and Boise (25,000 students) — as well as Kuna (5,500 students).
Only Ada County is expected to move into the red category Tuesday. The other counties in CDH’s coverage area — Boise, Elmore and Valley — are expected to stay in the yellow category (Category 2), which comes with a recommendation for limited in-person learning.
“While we are seeing cases within our schools and are working closely with those impacted, fortunately, at this time, we are not seeing much school transmission, where people are becoming infected from others in the classroom environment,” Russ Duke, director for Central District Health, said in a news release.
The health district outlined several recommendations for schools to follow if a school district decides to keep holding in-person classes in the red category. They include physical distancing measures and a 14-day quarantine if a student or faculty member is exposed to an identified case.
Following Central District Health’s guidance, the Boise School District plans to continue phasing students into a hybrid schedule, with students attending in-person classes twice a week. Third through sixth graders returned this week. Junior high and high school students are on schedule to return Tuesday, Oct. 20.
The district will use that hybrid model through the entire fall semester, Boise Deputy Superintendent Lisa Roberts said during Friday morning’s school board meeting. The second semester begins Jan. 11.
Boise originally planned to return to in-person classes five days a week Nov. 9, a goal it has abandoned.
“We had lofty goals of bringing our students back five days a week beginning on Nov. 9,” Roberts said. “However, with the amount of spread in the community, we just cannot adequately distance enough if we have all of our students back in the classrooms. It’s been working really well with half of the population back on any given day.”
All West Ada students attend in-person classes at least twice a week. Kindergarten through third grade are back five days a week. Fourth graders will start returning for a full week Monday.
Boise Schools will break with Central District Health advice and continue running its sports programs in the red category of community spread.
CDH said extracurricular activities are “high-risk” and have led to “a number of exposures and quarantines.” It recommends pausing activities where physical distancing and face coverings are not practical and can’t be enforced until dropping back into the yellow category.
“We’re tracking the data,” Boise Schools spokesperson Dan Hollar told the Idaho Statesman. “We know we’ve only had about five cases regarding athletics. Our protocols are working, for the most part.”
West Ada and Kuna already went against CDH advice when they started their sports programs in late August and early September. Boise was the only Ada County school district to follow its advice on sports at the time.
Boise State sees decline in new coronavirus cases on campus
Boise State University reported a decrease in new cases on campus Friday, the first time since September the campus hasn’t reported an upward trend.
The university reported 53 new cases among students and faculty during the week of Oct. 2-8. Cases at Boise State had been on the rise since early September. For the previous week — Sept. 25 - Oct. 1 — the university reported 97 new cases. The week prior — Sept. 18-24 — brought 85.
Of Friday’s cases, 30 were found among off-campus students and 22 among residential students. Just one faculty member was among the cases reported Friday.
In total, BSU has 402 reported cases on its campus.
The number of residential students in isolation beds also decreased. Last Friday, 54 out of 115 isolation beds were occupied. This week, 32 out of 153 available isolation beds were being used.
Hospitalizations, new cases of COVID-19 on the rise in Idaho
Health officials around Idaho added 667 new coronavirus cases to the state’s totals on Thursday — 514 confirmed cases and 153 probable cases. The Thursday total is the third-highest case count in a single day since the start of the coronavirus outbreak.
As of Thursday, Idaho’s seven-day rolling average of new cases is up to 554.7. That number was 263.9 cases per day roughly three weeks ago.
In addition to the rising case count, hospitalizations around Idaho appear to be growing. As of Monday, 191 people were hospitalized because of the coronavirus, which causes the COVID-19 respiratory disease. On Oct. 1, that number was 151.
Idaho’s COVID-19 positive testing rate is also up throughout the state, increasing for the third straight week. For the week of Sept. 27-Oct. 3, Idaho’s positive testing rate was 10.5% out of 24,841 tests taken in the state, according to statistics from the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.
Five out of Idaho’s seven health districts reported increasing positive testing percentages, with the exceptions of the Panhandle Health District in North Idaho and the Boise-based Central District Health.
Two coronavirus-related deaths were announced Thursday. Fatalities were reported in Bonneville and Cassia counties, bringing their totals to 20 and eight respectively. The Bonneville County death was that of a man in his 70s, according to Eastern Idaho Public Health.
Idaho has reported 504 deaths in the state connected to COVID-19.
As for new cases, Ada and Twin Falls counties each added 94 new confirmed cases on Thursday. Just behind them was Canyon County, adding 55.
Several counties around the state reported double-digit confirmed cases, including Kootenai (33 new), Bonneville (32), Bannock (27), Minidoka (27), Madison (24), Cassia (23), Jefferson (13), Jerome (10) and Nez Perce (10).
Idaho has 41,951 confirmed cases of the coronavirus statewide. Health and Welfare report 23,678 of those cases are presumed to have recovered. The department also reports there are 4,686 probable cases of the virus in Idaho.
As of Thursday, 326,789 people have been tested for the coronavirus in Idaho, and 12.8% of those people have tested positive, according to the state.
All Idaho counties — with the exception of Adams County — have reports of community spread.
Coronavirus cases have been found in all of Idaho’s 44 counties: Ada 12,652, Adams 27, Bannock 1,230, Bear Lake 51, Benewah 160, Bingham 1,016, Blaine 687, Boise 58, Bonner 355, Bonneville 2,562, Boundary 49, Butte 57, Camas 31, Canyon 8,085, Caribou 121, Cassia 809, Clark 33, Clearwater 78, Custer 68, Elmore 304, Franklin 180, Fremont 253, Gem 306, Gooding 299, Idaho 228, Jefferson 573, Jerome 753, Kootenai 2,925, Latah 655, Lemhi 105, Lewis 50, Lincoln 80, Madison 1,038, Minidoka 771, Nez Perce 481, Oneida 28, Owyhee 320, Payette 851, Power 267, Shoshone 219, Teton 197, Twin Falls 2,483, Valley 95, Washington 361.
This story was originally published October 9, 2020 at 11:47 AM.
