With few mitigation measures, Tucson-area schools seeing ‘uncontrolled spread’ of COVID-19 | Local news

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“Cases are spreading very quickly,” said McGovern. “Delta is a different animal than the one we encountered late last year, and portability is ten times higher than it was in the spring.”

While containment efforts are much more limited than last year, with a recent state law banning schools from wearing masks, overcrowded classrooms, lacking space for social distance, and funding for hybrid learning, the county’s health ministry is helping on an individual basis schools together to reinforce any mitigation measures that schools can still access.

Open since June 20, Vail has already had numerous classroom closures due to breakouts.

Additional staff, both to distribute the students to different parts of campus and to help those who need to go to distance learning during the quarantine, would be helpful, says Debbie Penn, Vail’s assistant superintendent.

The district, like others, not only takes care of school operations and the education of children in the context of a typical school year, but also has to contend with the difficulty that many students require occasional distance learning.

Penn says they can do it, but that it is a heavy workload.

In the final year of school, transmission within schools was relatively low, which experts say was due to all the mitigation measures, most notably universal masking and social distancing. In addition to increasing school outbreaks, the state is also seeing an increase in child hospital admissions for Covid-19.

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