Parents of school age children should remember that risk is cumulative. Lowering your risk at home by avoiding crowds and enclosed public indoor spaces where you don’t know the vaccination status of others can help reduce the whole family’s risk. Paying attention to the community transmission and vaccination rates and wearing masks in risky settings can also help.
“Think through what you do have control over and what you can do yourself,” Dr. Stuart said. “Try to minimize unnecessary exposure. Think of school as an essential activity. The school might be one source of risk, but minimize the other potential sources for the household.”
Home testing is also an option, although it can get costly at about $12 per test. Regular testing of school-aged children, at weekly intervals or before a family visit, can give parents peace of mind when families spend time with people outside their households. While schools may adopt their own testing protocols, there’s no general public health recommendation for regular home testing, which isn’t practical or affordable for most people. You can learn more about home testing here.
And of course, keep children home if they have any respiratory symptoms, remembering that other viral respiratory infections, including respiratory syncytial virus (R.S.V.), are circulating as well.
What should parents do if their school district doesn’t have a mask policy?
The American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended that everyone over age 2 wear masks this fall in school and care facilities. The C.D.C. recently changed its guidance to recommend masks for all children returning to school this fall, but school policies related to masking and Covid precautions are decided by individual states, and they vary widely. In Arkansas, state lawmakers have banned mask mandates, tying the hands of school board members who want to allow local school leaders to make the decision. Parents in New Jersey and California are suing to prevent mask mandates. And at a recent school board meeting in Orange County, Fla., parents clashed over whether masks should be required in schools. The school board voted two weeks ago to end its mask mandate.
“With school starting and the change in the mask policy and with the growing numbers, I am having literal angina,” said Rebecca Jacques, an Orange County, Fla., resident whose 11-year-old daughter turns 12 soon, but won’t be fully vaccinated by the time school starts Aug. 10. “They are responsible for providing a safe learning environment. What’s safe about this?”
Most public health experts agree masking is a good idea, and the C.D.C. has said mask mandates in schools are associated with a roughly 20 percent reduction in Covid-19 incidence. But even in schools with mask mandates, compliance by children is never 100 percent. And masks are only one of many possible precautions schools can take. Parents in school districts without mask mandates should learn what other steps are being taken, including regular testing and ventilation measures. Parents can ask their own children to wear masks in schools, but masking is far less effective if most kids aren’t doing it.
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