Category Archives: Covid-19

BARAMTI, India (NEXSTAR) A 76-year-old woman in India, who tested positive for COVID-19, woke up moments before her cremation, according to local media reports in India.

According to India Today, the woman was isolated at home when her condition worsened on May 10. The womans family was transporting her to a local hospital when she fell unconscious.

The family, assuming she had died, returned home and prepared for her cremation. She started crying and opened her eyes moments before the family was planning to begin her cremation, according to Santosh Gaikwad, a police official in Baramati.

The woman is now being treated at a local hospital.

After hitting record highs for weeks, the number of new COVID-19 cases in India was stabilizing, said Dr. V.K. Paul, a government health expert.

The Health Ministry on Sunday reported 311,170 confirmed cases in the past 24 hours, down from 326,098 on Saturday. It also reported 4,077 additional deaths, taking the total fatalities to 270,284. Both figures are almost certainly a vast undercount, experts say.

Police in India are reaching out to villagers in northern India to investigate the recovery of bodies buried in shallow sand graves or washed up on the Ganges River banks, prompting speculation on social media that theyre the remains of COVID-19 victims.

In jeeps and boats, police used portable loudspeakers with microphones asking people not to dispose of bodies in rivers. We are here to help you perform the last rites, police said.

On Friday, rains exposed the cloth coverings of bodies buried in shallow sand graves on a wide, flat riverbank in Prayagraj, a city in Uttar Pradesh state. While officials say the riverside burials have taken place for decades, the sheer numbers in the shadow of the pandemic are focusing more attention on the practice.

Navneet Sehgal, a state government spokesman, on Sunday denied local media reports that more than 1,000 corpses of COVID-19 victims had been recovered from rivers in the past two weeks. I bet these bodies have nothing to do with COVID-19, he said.

He said some villagers did not cremate their dead as is customary, due to a Hindu tradition during some periods of religious significance, and instead disposed of them in rivers or by digging graves on riverbanks.

Ramesh Kumar Singh, a member of Bondhu Mahal Samiti, a philanthropic organization that helps cremate bodies, said the number of deaths is very high in rural areas, and poor people have been disposing of bodies in the river because of the exorbitant cost of performing the last rites and a shortage of wood. The cost of cremation has tripled up to 15,000 rupees ($210).

On Saturday, an Associated Press photojournalist estimated there were at least 300 shallow riverside graves on a sand bar near near Prayagraj. Each grave was covered by an orange, yellow or reddish cloth and appeared laid out in the same direction. Several policemen were at the scene, but allowed a family who arrived in a small truck to bury a 75-year-old woman at the site.

K.P. Singh, a senior police officer, said authorities had earmarked a cremation ground on the Prayagraj riverbank for those who died of COVID-19, and police were no longer allowing any burials on the riverfront. Authorities in Sehgal state have found a small number of bodies on the riverbanks, he said, but didnt give a figure.

However, on Sunday, a 30-year-old Buddhist came to the same riverbank in Prayagraj with other family members and buried his mother, who he said had died of a heart attack.

She was not infected with COVID-19, Vijay Kumar told the AP, adding that his religion allows both cremation and burial, but I chose burial.

Health authorities last week retrieved 71 bodies that washed up on a Ganges River bank in neighboring Bihar state.

Authorities performed post mortems but said they could not confirm the cause of death due to decomposition.

A dozen corpses were also found last week buried in sand at two locations on the riverbank in Unnao district, 40 kilometers (25 miles) southwest of Lucknow, the Uttar Pradesh state capital. District Magistrate Ravindra Kumar said an investigation is underway to identify the cause of death.

Indias two big states, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, with nearly 358 million people in total, are among the worst hit in the virus surge sweeping through the country with devastating death tolls. Hapless villagers have been rushing the sick to nearby towns and cities for treatment, many of them dying on the way, victims of Indias crumbling health care.

After hitting record highs for weeks, the number of new cases was stabilizing, said Dr. V.K. Paul, a government health expert.

The Health Ministry on Sunday reported 311,170 confirmed cases in the past 24 hours, down from 326,098 on Saturday.

It also reported 4,077 additional deaths, taking the total fatalities to 270,284. Both figures are almost certainly a vast undercount, experts say.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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76-year-old with COVID-19 wakes up moments before cremation in India: reports - WBOY.com

EDITORS NOTE: Because the state updates the vaccination numbers at 12 p.m. daily and KWWL's COVID-19 update is released before then, the vaccination numbers will be from Noon the previous day.

(KWWL) There were 136 new, confirmed cases from 10 a.m. Saturday to 10 a.m. Sunday,according to thestates dashboard,bringing the states total number of cases to 369,355.

The states website says that of the 369,355 people who have tested positive, 354,764 have recovered. This is 233 more recoveries than what the state reported Thursday.

The state is reporting one additional COVID-19 death, with a death toll of 6,000.

Subtracting the number of recoveries (354,764) and the number of deaths (6,000) from the total number of cases (369,355) shows there are currently 8,591 active positive cases in the state.

As of Sunday morning, there were 30 patients hospitalized in Iowa within the last 24 hours and the total number of hospitalizations is 145, which is down from 147. Of those, 42 are in the ICU (same as Saturday), and 20 are on ventilators (up 1 from Saturday).

As of Noon on Saturday, according to the statesCOVID-19 vaccine dashboard, 2,493,080 total doses have been administered to Iowa residents and 1,255,962 individuals have completed the series. This is 14,689 more completed vaccinations than Noon on Friday.

Black Hawk County:389 more residents have been fully vaccinated for a total of 51,979

Linn County:945 more residents have been fully vaccinated for a total of 95,976.

Johnson County:755 more residents have been fully vaccinated for a total of 74,350.

Dubuque County:253 more residents have been fully vaccinated for a total of 44,816.

You can view thedashboardfor more vaccine data. You can find more vaccine information and storieshere.

View COVID-19 numbers from Saturday here.

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MAY 16: 6,000 Iowans have died from COVID-19, less than 150 new cases - kwwl.com

On 30 December 2019, the Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases notified the world about a pneumonia of unknown cause in Wuhan, China (1). Since then, scientists have made remarkable progress in understanding the causative agent, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), its transmission, pathogenesis, and mitigation by vaccines, therapeutics, and non-pharmaceutical interventions. Yet more investigation is still needed to determine the origin of the pandemic. Theories of accidental release from a lab and zoonotic spillover both remain viable. Knowing how COVID-19 emerged is critical for informing global strategies to mitigate the risk of future outbreaks.

In May 2020, the World Health Assembly requested that the World Health Organization (WHO) director-general work closely with partners to determine the origins of SARS-CoV-2 (2). In November, the Terms of Reference for a ChinaWHO joint study were released (3). The information, data, and samples for the study's first phase were collected and summarized by the Chinese half of the team; the rest of the team built on this analysis. Although there were no findings in clear support of either a natural spillover or a lab accident, the team assessed a zoonotic spillover from an intermediate host as likely to very likely, and a laboratory incident as extremely unlikely [(4), p. 9]. Furthermore, the two theories were not given balanced consideration. Only 4 of the 313 pages of the report and its annexes addressed the possibility of a laboratory accident (4). Notably, WHO Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus commented that the report's consideration of evidence supporting a laboratory accident was insufficient and offered to provide additional resources to fully evaluate the possibility (5).

As scientists with relevant expertise, we agree with the WHO director-general (5), the United States and 13 other countries (6), and the European Union (7) that greater clarity about the origins of this pandemic is necessary and feasible to achieve. We must take hypotheses about both natural and laboratory spillovers seriously until we have sufficient data. A proper investigation should be transparent, objective, data-driven, inclusive of broad expertise, subject to independent oversight, and responsibly managed to minimize the impact of conflicts of interest. Public health agencies and research laboratories alike need to open their records to the public. Investigators should document the veracity and provenance of data from which analyses are conducted and conclusions drawn, so that analyses are reproducible by independent experts.

Finally, in this time of unfortunate anti-Asian sentiment in some countries, we note that at the beginning of the pandemic, it was Chinese doctors, scientists, journalists, and citizens who shared with the world crucial information about the spread of the virusoften at great personal cost (8, 9). We should show the same determination in promoting a dispassionate science-based discourse on this difficult but important issue.

Link:

Investigate the origins of COVID-19 - Science Magazine

KYLE, Texas (KXAN) The city of Kyle will vaccinate approximately 1,000 residents with their first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine in a mass vaccination event Sunday.

The event, hosted in partnership with Hays CISD, State Rep. Erin Zweiners office and the National Guard, will be open to interested residents 18 years or older, per a city news release.

No vaccine appointments are required for the event, which is operating as a drive-thru site. Vaccines will be administered at Lehman High School, located at 1700 Lehman Road, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. or until doses run out.

Residents are required to wear a face covering while at the vaccination site. Those who receive their Moderna shot are advised to return for their second dose on Sunday, June 13.

More information regarding the event is available on the city of Kyles COVID-19 resources page.

More here:

1,000 COVID-19 vaccines available in City of Kyle mass vaccination event - KXAN.com

A poorly calibrated scale might, for example, tell you that bag of produce weighs and costs more than it actually does. Or it could register a lower weight and cost, shaving a few cents off your grocery bill at your grocer's expense.

Consider the number of transactions your local grocery store handles each day and the cumulative cost of misplacing cents becomes clear.

Fortunately, there's a team of people in Minnesota whose responsibility it is to inspect those and numerous other instruments.

Trouble is, the agency they work for is strapped for cash due to COVID-19. To stabilize their finances, they've asked the Minnesota Legislature for $1.5 million, or roughly 41% of their annual revenue, from the state general fund.

"We're really hopeful that we can get the funding through so that we are able to continue those services," Minnesota Department of Commerce Commissioner Grace Arnold said.

The request underscores what officials say is an increasingly unstable source of revenue for the department's Weights and Measures Division. The division, which also inspects gas station pumps and performs fuel quality checks, is funded primarily by a $1 fee charged to fuel distributors for every 1,000 gallons of petroleum they receive.

Minnesota Department of Commerce Commissioner Grace Arnold

Eighty-nine cents out of every dollar goes to the division, which is anticipating an $800,000 decrease in fee collections this fiscal year. That owes to a depressed level of motor travel caused by the coronavirus pandemic, according to Arnold.

Standing in a fluorescent-lit laboratory at the division's Burnsville headquarters one recent afternoon, Valare Falkner said it also threatens to delay the replacement of decades-old equipment used to screen fuel samples.

Save for three or four instruments, "almost everything in here is at or past its expected life," Falkner, the division's deputy director said.

The less equipment the lab has, the fewer tests that can be conducted, according to Falkner. And fuel samples the lab can't get to in time may then have to be sent to private labs that charge $150 to $200 per test, she said, "which isn't really feasible either for us."

If budget cuts were made, according to department spokesperson Mo Schriner, the division's field inspectors might also have to extend the amount of time that an given scale goes uncalibrated. They currently aim to inspect lightweight scales, such as the ones at the grocery store, at least once every two years, with industrial and agricultural scales receiving check-ups every year and a half to two years.

The dip in fee collections also raises questions about the fee's long-term viability given the gradual adoption of electric and more fuel-efficient cars, not that electrification has gone unnoticed in the world of weights and measures. The National Institute for Standards and Technology, the federal agency to which state weights and measures offices conform, already has plans to adopt official inspection methods for electric car charging stations.

At least for now, the department appears focused on securing a more stable source of funding for next fiscal year from the state general fund.

"If we can solve it for this session," Arnold said, then electrification will be "something that we can think more about in the long term."

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COVID-19 leaves Minnesota's Weights and Measures office strapped for cash | The Globe - The Globe

by: Robert Pandolfino, Nexstar Media Wire

FILE This Jan. 24, 2021, file photo shows a vial of the Pfizer vaccine for COVID-19 in Seattle. U.S. regulators on Monday, May 10, 2021, expanded use of Pfizers shot to those as young as 12, sparking a race to protect middle and high school students before they head back to class in the fall. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)

TAMPA (WFLA) In a move that took the country one step closer to pre-pandemic daily life, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention eased the indoor mask-wearing guidance for fully vaccinated people, allowing them to safely stop wearing masks inside in most places.

But many are wondering what that will mean for the workplace will employers have the right to ask workers if they have received the COVID-19 vaccine? Or request proof of vaccination?

Companies including Delta have implemented new rules requiring new employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19 starting Monday. The airline wont impose the same requirement on current employees, more than 60% of whom are vaccinated, a Delta spokesman said Friday.

Unlike Delta, airlines including American, United, Southwest and Alaska said they do not plan to require vaccination for current employees or new hires. But, American Airlines said it will give vaccinated employees an extra vacation day and a $50 gift card.

Jascha Clark, a shareholder at Salt Lake City law firm Ray Quinney & Nebeker, told KTVX there is guidance from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on this topic.

Employers may ask employees if theyve been vaccinated against COVID-19 and may also ask employees to provide proof of vaccination, and the reason that this is allowed is because the EEOC generally prohibits inquiries that are disability related, he explained.

The Americans with Disabilities Act states that an employer can have a policy with a requirement that an individual shall not pose a direct threat to the health or safety of individuals in the workplace.

An unvaccinated person is not automatically a threat to others, however, and the employer might also have to make accommodations depending on the reasons behind the vaccine hesitancy.

An employee with a religious objection or a disability may need to be excused from the mandate or otherwise accommodated, John Lomax, an attorney with Snell & Wilmer in Phoenix, told the Society for Human Resource Management. Additionally, if an objecting employee is a union-represented employee, the employer may need to bargain and reach an agreement with the union before mandating vaccines.

Clark says he has been counseling clients that employers really do have a legitimate business reason to keep track of employees who have been vaccinated for safety reasons.

Employers can then use this information, together with the risk of transmission by people whove been vaccinated, to inform decisions about reopening and expanding the number of individuals in the area and that sort of thing.

But does asking for proof of vaccination violate the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, more commonly known as HIPAA? Clark says it doesnt.

Generally, HIPAA prevents healthcare providers from sharing information. Here, youre asking the employee themself to provide the information and so its their information theyre able to share it if they want to, he stated.

Could an incentive be the way to go for employers?

AsurveybyJobvites 2021 Job Seeker Nation Report, found that employers who incentivize getting the vaccine helps. Of the surveyed workers who disagreed with vaccine mandates in the workplace, one-third saidthey would get the vaccine if their employer incentivized them.

In a survey conducted by the University of California, Los Angeles, more than 75,000 unvaccinated people were interviewed, and about a third of them said a cash payment of as much as $100 would make them more likely to get the COVID-19 shot.

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine made a splash Wednesday when he announced that a special lottery for people who choose to get vaccinated.

Five lucky adult residents who get shots will receive $1 million during a series of weekly drawings. Five children between the ages of 12 and 17 will be able to will a full-ride scholarship to an Ohio state-run University.

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Can my employer ask if I have received the COVID-19 vaccine? What you need to know - WBOY.com

Virginia is ending its universal mask mandate and will lift all COVID-19 mitigation restrictions on May 28, two weeks earlier than planned, Gov. Ralph Northam announced late Friday afternoon.

In a brief video message, Northam said the state would follow the new guidance from the Centers of Disease Control and Preventionand no longer require fully vaccinated Virginians to wear masks indoors, except in certain circumstances, effective Friday at midnight. The move comes about 11 1/2 months after Northam put the mask mandate in place in late May 2020, as COVID-19 cases were soaring statewide.

Northam said businesses may still require patrons to wear masks indoors and that masks would still be required to be worn in schools. He cited the low rates of vaccinations among children as a reason for continuing to require masks in schools. Vaccines were just approved this week for adolescents aged 12 to 15, and no vaccine has been approved for children under age 12.

Northam previously had announced a plan to lift all of the state's coronavirus restrictions, such as capacity limits indoors and social-distancing requirements, on June 15. However, based on the state'simproving numbers, he said the restrictions would all be ended on May 28. This will follow a previously announced easing of many restrictions beginning tomorrow.

"Virginians have been doing the right thing and we're seeing the results," Northam said in the video. The state's number of new COVID-19 cases is at its lowest level since early last summer, and Northern Virginia's numbers are at their lowest since the first month of the pandemic.

"The vaccines are clearly working and they are saving lives," Northam said.

Nearly 4.1 million Virginians have received at least one dose of a vaccine, and over 3 million are fully vaccinated. Northam urged all Virginians to get vaccinated.

"It's very simple," he said. "It's either a shot or a mask. It's up to you."

The CDC guidelines state that fully vaccinated individuals do not have to wear masks in most indoor settings, except on public transit, in health care facilities and in congregate settings. Employees in certain sectors including restaurants, retail, fitness, personal care, and entertainment must continue to wear masks unless fully vaccinated under the CDC guidance.

Northam's office said in a news release that Virginia's state of emergency for the pandemic will remain in place at least through June 30 to give local governments flexibility and support vaccination efforts. Northam plans to take executive action to ensure individuals have the option to wear masks up to and after that date, as masks typically are otherwise illegal in Virginia.

Watch Gov. Ralph Northam's video update ending Virginia's mask mandate.

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Virginia lifts mask mandate, will end COVID-19 restrictions on May 28 - Inside NoVA

(NEXSTAR) With more than half the country at least partially vaccinated, many are eager to venture forth from their homes and travel.

But before you hit the road, its important to remember that COVID-19 is still prevalent in the U.S., and airports bring together people from all over the place not just from the region where the airport is located.

[Hawaii news on the goLISTEN to KHON 2GO weekday mornings at 7:30 a.m.]

So whats the worst contagion spot in an airport?

According to Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease expert at the University of California at San Francisco School of Medicine, the main contagion spot is wherever noses and mouths get together.

Its hanging out at the food court, hanging out at the gate those are the hotspots, he said.

Chin-Hong said you should also be conscientious of how youre getting to and from the airport. Public transportation and ride shares are higher risk than traveling solo in a car, naturally.

The operating principle, Chin-Hong says, is the more unknown mouths and noses you get together, the higher the risk.

And in the airport, its not just people from around the country, but the world. You dont know where people have been, even if they had a negative test before [entering the country].

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently updated its domestic travel guidelines.

The organization recommends delaying travel until you are fully vaccinated, and to continue following its recommendations for safe traveling: wearing a mask, staying 6 feet away from others, avoiding crowds and washing or sanitizing your hands frequently.

International travel is a bit stickier. The U.S. Department of State has a list of countries that it does not recommend people travel to at this time, including:

The State Department says to exercise increased caution in these countries:

For more information on places you can travel, check your desired countrys local embassy website or the U.S Department of State website.

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This is the biggest contagion spot for COVID-19 in airports - KHON2

Mount Everest, the world highest peak, and other peaks of the Himalayan range are seen through an aircraft window during a mountain flight from Kathmandu, Nepal January 15, 2020. REUTERS/Monika Deupala/File Photo

An international expedition abandoned its attempt to scale Mount Everest on Saturday, citing risks posed by an increasing number of COVID-19 cases at the base camp, the organisers said.

Some climbers were evacuated from Everest base camp in April after they fell ill with COVID-19 symptoms as Nepal battles a brutal second wave of infections.

Lukas Furtenbach, of Austrian expedition organising company Furtenbach Adventures, said his team of climbers from America, Norway, Israel, Germany, Austria, Italy, Luxembourg and Romania were abandoning the climb for safety reasons as the number of COVID-19 infections at the base camp was increasing.

"To climb ... with these massively increasing coronavirus numbers and risk the lives of our 20 climbers, 4 mountain guides and 27 Sherpas carelessly, would be irresponsible," Furtenbach said in a statement.

Infections at Everest base camp have surged as "elementary precautionary measures were simply not observed" by some teams, he said, without naming any expeditions.

Tendi Sherpa of the Iceland Trekking and Expedition company, which provided local support to the team, confirmed climbers were returning for fear of the disease.

Department of Tourism Director Mira Acharya said she had no information of any expedition evacuating due to COVID-19 fears.

"Doctors at the base camp said the situation was not as serious as it was reported," she told Reuters. "I did not see any terrible situation there," said Acharya, who returned this week after overseeing preparations at the base camp.

Nepal has reported 447,704 coronavirus cases and 4,856 deaths, according to government data.

The Himalayan nation, which earns millions of dollars from climbers every year, closed the mountain in March 2020 due to the pandemic, but reopened for this year's climbing season that started in April. It issued a record 408 permits to climbers attempting to scale the 8,848.86-metre (29,031.69-foot) peak.

Acharya said more than 150 people had climbed the mountain this month and others were waiting for a new weather window to open up.

Two climbers died of exhaustion on the mountain this week.

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Foreign expedition abandons Everest attempt citing COVID-19 risks - Reuters

The school-age population accounts for a growing share of recent coronavirus cases across northern Michigan. Lisa Peacock, health officer for Otsego County, told NPR that without the school district's help it would be "literally impossible" to keep up with contact tracing. Getty Images hide caption

The school-age population accounts for a growing share of recent coronavirus cases across northern Michigan. Lisa Peacock, health officer for Otsego County, told NPR that without the school district's help it would be "literally impossible" to keep up with contact tracing.

Chris Hodges, the principal of Gaylord High School in Otsego County, Michigan, never thought he'd be a contact tracer.

"I definitely thought, you know, 'Why why am I doing this?'" he says with a laugh. "That's not what I went to school for."

In what has become a regular part of his school day, Hodges fields reports on his charges such as hearing from the Health Department of Northwest Michigan that a student had tested positive for the novel coronavirus, and was in school for three days when she might have been contagious.

One Tuesday in April, after the school day was over, he found himself walking the almost-empty halls with a laptop and a tape measure, making a list of other students who sat close enough to their sick classmate that they would need to quarantine.

Lisa Peacock, health officer for the department, says that without the school district's help it would be "literally impossible" to keep up with contact tracing.

Gaylord High School principal Chris Hodges measures the space between seats in a yearbook class. A student in the class tested positive for covid, and Hodges is working with the local health department to trace people who might have been exposed to her at school. Brett Dahlberg/WCMU hide caption

Gaylord High School principal Chris Hodges measures the space between seats in a yearbook class. A student in the class tested positive for covid, and Hodges is working with the local health department to trace people who might have been exposed to her at school.

The school-age population has accounted for a growing share of recent coronavirus cases across northern Michigan, and Peacock says quickly identifying people exposed to those cases and telling them how to quarantine is crucial to protecting communities and containing spread.

When Hodges first started helping the health department with contact tracing, he found himself calling teachers on weekends, holidays and late in the day after they'd gone home, asking them where a particular student sat and struggling to orient himself in the classroom as they described the student's position over the phone.

It happened so often that he's now requiring each teacher to keep an up-to-date seating chart in a bright-yellow folder on top of their desk, so he can find it easily.

But in this case, the teacher, Hannah Romel, was still at school. The student Hodges was tracing is in her yearbook class, which has different seating arrangements every day. Romel handed Hodges the three charts, and he got to work.

In each place Romel had marked the student, Hodges extended his tape measure to the surrounding desks.

Teachers have spaced their seats out as much as they can, he says, but sometimes they can't quite get to the 6-foot distance required to avoid counting a student as a close contact.

(The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its guidance last month to allow for 3-foot distancing between desks, but only in communities where transmission is low. In this district, Superintendent Brian Pearson explains, during Michigan's recent surge in cases, 6-foot separation is the standard.)

Hodges moved quickly, both because if he didn't complete the contact tracing the same day, the school can't open the next, and because he wanted to get in touch with the families of students exposed to the virus right away.

"We want to make those phone calls as soon as we can, so that those students aren't at work, aren't at church, aren't going to other people's houses. We want to prevent the spread of COVID not only inside our walls, but in our community," he says.

Hodges then passes on the information, about who was in close contact with the infected student, to the local health department. Other nearby school districts run similar operations.

Nationally, this kind of relationship between schools and health departments is not typical in normal times, but it is happening with some regularity during the pandemic, according to Adriane Casalotti, chief of government and public affairs for the National Association of County and City Health Officials.

Public health funding has declined over the past few decades, she says, forcing local departments to cut staff members who could have boosted their contact-tracing capacity.

Still, getting schools and health departments to work together can greatly help communities, Casalotti says.

Peacock, the local health officer, says that once her staffers get word of exposures at local schools, they will also get in touch with the families to talk them through the details.

"People always have questions," she says. "They have questions about 'What does this mean? What does it mean that I'm quarantined for 14 days?' We recognize that."

And, in some cases, the health department needs more information than Hodges can give, Peacock adds. They might want to find out whether a coronavirus variant is at play, or do a more detailed investigation of how students got sick and where they were, when they were contagious.

Back in Romel's yearbook classroom, Hodges found two students had sat within an area just shy of 6 feet from their classmate who tested positive. They'll need to quarantine for two weeks from the date of this last exposure.

Romel says she's still surprised when she gets the news that a student has gotten sick or infected.

"I worry about the kid," she says. "I hope that it's a mild case, and they get to just be OK and get back to school after their quarantine period and come back and be learning with us again."

After a quick chat with Romel about whether the class did any group work on the days in question (they didn't, which Hodges says is a relief, because it complicates his process), he headed off to the next classroom.

In all, 14 students will be quarantined as a result of exposure to this coronavirus case.

That sounds like a lot, but Hodges says that's a far cry from a single day last month, when 15 students tested positive, and each of them had several close contacts. The number of students who had to quarantine from those potential exposures was in the dozens.

Making phone calls to families informing them their child will need to stay home from school for up to two weeks is not an enjoyable part of the day, for him or the families, said Hodges, but in the long run he's gratified to play a role in mitigating the extent of the pandemic.

This story comes from NPR's reporting partnership with WCMU and KHN.

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Schools Are Helping With COVID-19 Contact Tracing : Shots - Health News - NPR