As of Thursday November 5th, Quebec reported that since the start of the school year, there has been a total of 1,642 schools with at least one confirmed case of COVID-19 – 865 of them still dealing with active cases. The total number of diagnosed infections (students and staff) stands at 8,129 – with 2,410 active cases. There have been temporary class closures, but no complete shutdowns of schools since they reopened. The government has upheld their theory that the infections in schools are not the main source of transmission, but a ‘reflection’ of what is going on from outside in the community. However, two experts in the field of infectious disease and public health feel quite differently – maintaining that the main spread of the virus is coming from schools in Montreal (the epicentre of Quebec) and out into the community instead.
According to data from the public health department and educational system, obtained by the Montreal Gazette, Montreal’s ‘mostly poorly ventilated and crowded schools are now reporting more infectious clusters than in the workplace and health-care institutions combined’. They state that ‘this shift in transmission has implications for public health policy, as federal officials this week acknowledged that the coronavirus can spread easily through the air in lingering aerosols in addition to respiratory droplets, yet most Montreal schools without modern ventilation have no plans to install portable air purifiers in their classrooms’.
In their interview with Dr. Karl Weiss (President of the Association des médecins microbiologistes-infectiologues du Québec) on November 5th he said, ‘“Schools were the driver to start the second wave in Quebec, although the government did not recognize it… the number of cases started to go up 14 days after the French-language schools opened and 14 days after the English ones opened in Montreal. Schools are certainly a driver.” He then added, “It’s true for any respiratory virus. It’s true for the flu. It starts in schools, kids will bring the virus back home and infect the parents, and parents will get sick. Eventually the parents will infect their co-workers and it will spread to the community.” He also suggested that the main reason the ‘cases in Montreal have not sloped downward from a plateau of more than 200 a day in the last few weeks is that transmission is active in schools’. Dr. Weiss believes the cases were coming ‘from schools and from teenagers hugging each other’. He said, “I was walking towards my house and I saw a group of 20 to 30 teenagers without masks talking to each other because they have nowhere else to go. They can’t go do sports.”
Jean-Nicolas Aubé, spokesperson for Centre-Sud regional health board (CIUSSS) was also stated in the Gazette report as saying that ‘Despite the data on rising cases and outbreaks in schools, a spokesperson for the public health department denied that the school environment is driving the spread of the coronavirus in Montreal’ and ‘the schools are not acting like engines of outbreaks. In fact, schools are a reflection of community transmission. The cases in the school milieu are relatively stable, and in a majority of instances, the source of the transmission comes from parents.’
However, Montreal public health consultant Dr. Michael D. Levy, was stated in the report as saying, ‘there’s an obvious discrepancy between what the epidemiological data show about Montreal schools and Aubé’s assertion’ and ‘the percentage of cases in the schools is much higher than in the general population… Why is that? I don’t know how (public health) calculates this because they’re very cagey about sharing the data… I don’t know how they can tell most of the cases are coming from the home. When they opened the schools in the fall, there was an immediate surge in cases. I think it came from the schools because it wasn’t that bad during the summer even though bars, restaurants and gyms were open’.
Montreal’s Director of Public Health, Dr. Mylène Drouin had also said at a news conference on Friday October 30th, that ‘it was in the school milieu that we’re observing the biggest increase in terms of the number of cases and the number of outbreaks.’ It is all contrary to what Dr. Horacio Arruda, Quebec’s chief public health officer said. He attributes most outbreaks across the province to the workplace, but did not refer to Montreal – and suggested that ‘although schools have shuttered classes because of COVID-19 exposure, there is not that much transmission as such.’
Keeping schools open are proving to have serious implications for students with all the constant changes in their schedules and curriculum – making them feel increasingly stressed and worried. While closing schools have proven challenging as well, with social-isolation taking its toll. So where do we go from here as the virus continues to spread and with no real end in sight? Will it take a complete shutdown again and are children more resilient than many think and able to bounce back?
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