As a highly contagious strain of the coronavirus continues to push through the region once again, Cincinnati Public Schools has announced that it will require masks during the upcoming academic year.
On Wednesday, the CPS Board of Education voted to continue mask usage in all district buildings. All students and employees must wear masks when indoors.
The district had also required masks during in-person learning last year to protect students and teachers.
The CPS Board of Education had been considering another mask policy for several months but had pushed off voting in order to gather more information and explore options.
The district said it may rescind the masking policy if COVID-19 cases drop or after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorize COVID-19 vaccines for children age 11 and younger. Currently, only people age 12 and older are eligible for a Pfizer, Moderna or Johnson & Johnson (J&J) vaccine.
The first day of classes for Cincinnati Public Schools is August 19.
Health officials have long said that a combination of vaccinations and masking will help slow the highly infectious Delta variant of the coronavirus. In July, the CDC recommended that both unvaccinated and vaccinated individuals wear face masks, especially indoors and in regions of great virus transmission or low vaccination (the CDC labels most counties in the Cincinnati area as “substantial” or “high” risk). The federal agency also urged all K-12 schools to require masking for students, employees and visitors, regardless of whether they’ve received an authorized COVID-19 vaccine or not.
Dr. Patty Manning-Courtney, chief of staff at Cincinnati Children’s, recently said much of the safety measures are not up to the children, especially those younger than 12 who aren’t eligible for the vaccine.
“I don’t want to see the day where somebody under age 12 was infected because someone in their life chose not to be vaccinated or chose not to wear a mask,” Manning-Courtney said. “That would be a sad day.”
After the CDC announced its return to masking, Cincinnati Children’s shared a statement that urged masking for all K-12 students and employees.
“Cincinnati Children’s recommends that all children returning to in-person school wear masks, regardless of vaccination status,” the statement said in part. “Many children are not yet eligible to be vaccinated against COVID-19, and others should mask because no vaccine is 100% effective at preventing infection. In addition, teachers and staff should continue to wear masks, regardless of vaccination status.”
The Delta variant of the coronavirus has been responsible for the sharp uptick in cases, hospitalizations and deaths, and scientists warn that this strain is much more dangerous than Alpha, the original virus. People infected with Delta carry 1,000 times more of the virus, which makes it easier to transmit among others when speaking, singing, sneezing or breathing hard, particularly within indoor areas. Health experts say that Delta is more than twice as easy to spread than Alpha.
Unvaccinated individuals are at the highest risk for severe infection and substantial health issues from coronavirus, experts say, though some vaccinated individuals have also become infected due to Delta’s highly contagious nature. Symptoms and rates are less severe in individuals who are fully vaccinated with a Pfizer, Moderna or J&J COVID-19 vaccine, though. According to the CDC, a “fully vaccinated” person is one who is two weeks past their second dose of a two-dose vaccine (Pfizer and Moderna) or two weeks after a single-dose vaccine (J&J).
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This article appears in Aug 5-17, 2021.