By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
With COVID numbers climbing and the local presence of the Delta variant being confirmed, Wood County Health Commissioner Ben Robison will be meeting with the county’s school superintendents on Monday.
“We are preparing to release guidance for schools,” Robison reported to the Wood County Board of Health Thursday evening. “We are committed to working to keep kids in schools.”
Robison was reluctant to say if he would advise local school officials to mandate masks in buildings. But he did refer to the success that schools with mask mandates had last year.
“We have a whole year’s worth of data that says this really works,” Robison said.
The health department’s guidance on Monday will reflect the directives of the CDC, he said.
Bowling Green Superintendent Francis Scruci sent a letter home earlier this week to families and staff about the district’s plans to mandate masks on buses, but make them optional in school buildings.
But Scruci has stressed since the end of the school year, that the district must be ready to make changes when needed.
Unlike last year, when school districts adopted their own protocols for COVID-19, the superintendents talked this summer about having a united voice.
Robison may also be looking at dealing with the latest uptick in COVID with a united front among schools.
“This is a true community effort,” he said of preventing the spread. “We have to do it collectively.”
Bowling Green State University and Owens Community College have already announced mask mandates in classrooms.
After seeing single digit numbers of COVID cases earlier this summer, the cases started climbing again. As of today, Wood County hit 70 cases per 100,000 residents. The county recently moved into the “substantial” transmission level – triggering recommendations that residents wear masks when indoors.
The announcement Wednesday that the Delta variant had been found in the county was not a shock.
“It was likely we had Delta before,” Robison said, noting that 93% of current COVID cases in the U.S. are believed to be of the Delta variant. “Once it takes root, it becomes dominant.”
The best way for people to protect themselves and others from the Delta variant – or at least the severe effects of the variant – is for people to get vaccinated and to get back into prevention measures, Robison said.
People who are vaccinated have a 10-fold better chance of not experiencing severe symptoms from COVID, he said.
Robison said school-based vaccination clinics will be held throughout the county.
“We’re hoping to see a stronger uptick as we get close to school,” he said.
In Wood County, approximately 60% of eligible residents are vaccinated, he said.
The most vulnerable senior population has the highest vaccination numbers, but rates among younger residents need to improve, Robison said. The rate among ages 12 to 29 in the county is about 40%.
“We see a need to increase vaccinations in younger residents,” he said.
The Delta variant is far more transmissible than the original COVID strain. Carriers of the initial COVID infected an average of two more people. With Delta, the infection rate is eight to nine people.
Robison said he understands the frustration – people are sick of masks.
“I’m very weary of COVID. You probably are, too,” he said to the health board. “I can’t project how long this will take. More is being asked of us. This is a really disturbing turn of events.”
But Wood County must take steps to prevent the transmission of the Delta variant.
“We’re looking ahead to a time when this won’t be as much of a challenge,” Robison said.
But right now, if COVID isn’t quelled, it will continue to produce more variants.
“The longer that COVID can circulate, the greater chances to mutate,” he said.
