High Number of Coronavirus Cases in the Area
Finally, Gupta outlined how Georgia’s Fulton County, where his family lives, is “simply not there yet” in terms of having the number of coronavirus cases under control.
The county has not met the guidelines for full-time, face-to-face instruction. The guidelines require “the county rate of new cases per 100,000 people to be fewer than 100 for the last 14 days.” Fulton county’s current rate is 316.2.
“Recently, the Surgeon General said he would like to see positivity rates at less than 10% in communities before schools consider reopening,” Gupta wrote, sharing that Georgia’s is 11.3 percent. “We are close, but it is still worrisome to place students back into an environment with that much community viral spread.”
He also cited some examples in the past few weeks of “what may happen as schools start to reopen,” including an overnight camp in Georgia that had nearly 260 attendees test positive for coronavirus and a high school in the state that has already temporarily closed after more than a dozen positive tests in the first week.
“None of this is easy, and some families may arrive at a different conclusion after looking at the same data. In the age of COVID-19, it seems we are all forced to become amateur epidemiologists, while also being the best parents we can be,” Gupta concluded.
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