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Southwestern Public Health Prepares for Upcoming School Year

Thursday, 26 August 2021 at 05:53

Local Medical Officer of Health Dr. Joyce Lock says a good chunk of students and staff will be vaccinated going into the school year, but she is still expecting cases of COVID-19 to pop-up in classrooms.

OXFORD COUNTY - Southwestern Public Health is cautiously optimistic as kids get set to head back to class. 

Local Medical Officer of Health Dr. Joyce Lock says the start of the school year does cause some concern.

"We are a little bit on pins and needles about what is going to happen in September." 

She says the good news is that a good chunk of both students and staff over the age of 12 are vaccinated.

"So that doesn't mean that people won't be getting sick, but hopefully not very sick and that was our key goal. We knew we were never going to get rid of the COVID virus, but our aim was to make it no worse than the common cold." 

Dr. Lock says they're really concerned about kids 12 and under as the Delta variant does seem to impact younger people more than the original strain of COVID-19. 

"We are seeing that Delta variant impacts people over the age of 20, but also children more severely than the original variant." 

They do expect that there will be outbreaks in schools and some classrooms will be closed, but the goal is to keep schools open. 

"It is our sincere hope that with the larger chunk of people vaccinated, that we will have children in school, in the classroom setting much more this year, than they were last year." 

Kids will still need to wear masks and COVID screening will continue. Parents are strongly encouraged to keep your children home if they are showing any signs of the virus. 

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