EPftF: Interpreting Testing
Jun. 7th, 2020 03:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutSome schools in other countries have reopened. Generally speaking, there is coverage of this when it is about to happen or starts happening. However, at least in major US publications, there is only very rarely follow up to see how it went over a period of weeks. This is unfortunate, however, it is possible to follow up with local media coverage, altho it may require finding someone who can translate the language of the country in question to access the information. Google translate works in a pinch.
It would be very useful to identify comparators who have succeeded and who have not succeeded, so that we can learn from their efforts. This is how best practice improves over time. However, as anyone who has shopped for housing knows, location matters.
For example, Denmark has had good success in reopening schools without incident. However, their borders through most (all?) of the period of reopening have been closed. They are a small country. They never had a large outbreak. They are starting to open their borders now, but have indicated a reluctance to open the border with Sweden, _to which they are connected by a bridge_, because they do not want to import cases from a country which has had a much larger outbreak and much greater spread. Denmark is smaller in population than Massachusetts and, more importantly, Massachusetts cannot close its borders. There are places in the United States that might share enough physical isolation and border control that they can use Denmark as a model (Hawaii, presumably). My state is not one of them.
The NYT did an article about Carolinum Gymnasium in Neustrelitz Germany. Der Spiegel did a follow up mention of how that went some weeks later. They tested twice weekly (someone donated the tests, thus satisfying the free criteria), on a “voluntary” basis (but everyone complied, apparently, look it is Germany, I do not ask a lot of questions), and had no positive tests. They are a much larger country than Denmark, and they are not as able to close their borders as completely as Denmark, but they mostly closed their borders, certainly far more than any states in the US with the exceptions of Alaska and Hawaii. Their outbreak was larger than Denmark’s, but not huge, and when the Carolinum Gymnasium opened, it was in the context of quite low and falling new cases per day (I think on the order of 500 new cases per day, scaled per capita, that is less than 1/10 new cases per day in the United States and testing in the US is FAR less comprehensive than in Germany).
There was coverage of a school in Den Haag which opened, however, it had to close. At that time, new cases per day in the Netherlands per capita were very roughly double Germany — still, very far below where the United States is currently.
School districts in the United States which are in areas with very little travel to and through them, and which have very low local case counts and very few new cases might be able to model themselves on Denmark and Germany.
However, the lesson offered by the school in Den Haag is that low enough is really quite low, and the source of transmission that results in school closure is not going to be fixable with cleaning in the schools, and testing only detects problems after they have established themselves. What is going on in the outside community is what matters, and it is not under the control of the school system.
It would be very useful to identify comparators who have succeeded and who have not succeeded, so that we can learn from their efforts. This is how best practice improves over time. However, as anyone who has shopped for housing knows, location matters.
For example, Denmark has had good success in reopening schools without incident. However, their borders through most (all?) of the period of reopening have been closed. They are a small country. They never had a large outbreak. They are starting to open their borders now, but have indicated a reluctance to open the border with Sweden, _to which they are connected by a bridge_, because they do not want to import cases from a country which has had a much larger outbreak and much greater spread. Denmark is smaller in population than Massachusetts and, more importantly, Massachusetts cannot close its borders. There are places in the United States that might share enough physical isolation and border control that they can use Denmark as a model (Hawaii, presumably). My state is not one of them.
The NYT did an article about Carolinum Gymnasium in Neustrelitz Germany. Der Spiegel did a follow up mention of how that went some weeks later. They tested twice weekly (someone donated the tests, thus satisfying the free criteria), on a “voluntary” basis (but everyone complied, apparently, look it is Germany, I do not ask a lot of questions), and had no positive tests. They are a much larger country than Denmark, and they are not as able to close their borders as completely as Denmark, but they mostly closed their borders, certainly far more than any states in the US with the exceptions of Alaska and Hawaii. Their outbreak was larger than Denmark’s, but not huge, and when the Carolinum Gymnasium opened, it was in the context of quite low and falling new cases per day (I think on the order of 500 new cases per day, scaled per capita, that is less than 1/10 new cases per day in the United States and testing in the US is FAR less comprehensive than in Germany).
There was coverage of a school in Den Haag which opened, however, it had to close. At that time, new cases per day in the Netherlands per capita were very roughly double Germany — still, very far below where the United States is currently.
School districts in the United States which are in areas with very little travel to and through them, and which have very low local case counts and very few new cases might be able to model themselves on Denmark and Germany.
However, the lesson offered by the school in Den Haag is that low enough is really quite low, and the source of transmission that results in school closure is not going to be fixable with cleaning in the schools, and testing only detects problems after they have established themselves. What is going on in the outside community is what matters, and it is not under the control of the school system.