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School districts in the St. Louis area are sending out letters to schools this week explaining how health guidelines are changing this year. Many students are describing a more relaxed environment than they have been in in previous pandemic years.
Along with those messages, some schools are encouraging families to get students vaccinated against Covid-19. Local public health officials say now is the time to make sure children are protected from the coronavirus and other diseases.
This is the first school year that all ages will be eligible for the Covid-19 vaccine. said Amanda Brozowski, senior epidemiologist for the St. Louis County Department of Public Health.
“You have to get your vaccinations,” Brezozowski said. “If you’re a little late, get them now. “Start the process, especially if it’s something that requires more than one dose,” like the Covid-19 vaccine.
So far, overall vaccination coverage for COVID-19 has been low among young adults.
“If people are hesitant, on the fence, or just need a little more knowledge, please reach out and talk to or see your pediatrician. CDC website And you might be able to get some of the information you need,” Brezozowski said.
Most school districts in the state will have optional mask policies early this year, and school leaders are hoping for a normal start to classes, said Paul Ziegler, CEO of Education Plus, which works with many of the state’s school districts and charter schools.
“We know that Covid is still in our community, we know that we will still have some layers of mitigation in our schools, but hopefully they won’t be as severe as what we’ve seen in the past,” Ziegler said.
An exception is the Maplewood Richmond Heights School District, which sent a letter to families this week stating that masks are required for the first two weeks because of high community transmission in St. Louis County.
Starting Thursday night in Illinois, CDC said. The risk of Covid-19 is high in Madison and St. Clair counties. In Missouri, it is moderate in St. Louis and St. Louis County and low in St. Charles County. CDC Covid-19 guidelines have been relaxed For schools on Thursday, students no longer need to try to stay in class after contracting the virus.
Schools are also breaking other epidemic habits. The Parkway School District will not have a Covid-19 dashboard on its website that reports cases and positivity rates in schools. in Letter to familiesSuperintendent Keith Marty said masks are no longer required and the building’s roof deck will not be used to restore mask requirements.
“We are now implementing our standard communicable disease policy to respond to Covid,” Marty said. “This means we treat Covid cases at school in the same way as other infectious diseases.”
Public health officials said other vaccinations declined during the outbreak. seven It is required by the government to study at school. Jenelle Leighton, clinical quality manager at the St. Louis County Department of Public Health, said parents should check with their pediatrician to make sure their child is on track for a variety of important vaccinations.
“Now is the time for everyone to know that immunizations are extremely important and to look at the immunization schedule and the requirements for returning to the school year,” Leighton said.
Although not many cases have been reported in the area, schools are already preparing to respond to monkeypox. Education officials are using skills learned during the pandemic to be proactive, Ziegler said.
“We are much better at making quick decisions about how to deal with an epidemic than we were three years ago,” he said. “While there is no silver lining to the epidemic, our understanding and capacity to deal with it is certainly very different.
St. Louis Public Schools plans to release information about rabies, along with other health information, to families soon. The district plans to publish flu information on its COVID-19 dashboard and, as always, asks families to stay home from school if children are sick.
Nationally, the virus is spread mainly through close contact between adults. But anyone can get mumps because it’s spread by skin-to-skin contact or by touching clothing or bedding used by an infected person.
“I think that if schools have issues with their students, schools need to be very careful to make sure those issues are not isolated,” Brozozowski said. We need to protect the identity of the patients and ensure there is no stigma attached to them being infected with monkeypox.
It is St. Louis County Coordinate distribution A limited number of monkey vaccines available in the region.
Follow Kate on Twitter: @KGrumke
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