We would like to address some of the feedback we’ve received regarding the COVID-19 in schools study, the results of which suggest that the risk of school staff acquiring SARS-CoV-2 in schools is no greater than those who don’t work in schools.<\/p>\n\n
We wrote about this study\u00a0here<\/a>\u00a0based on a story that originally appeared on the\u00a0COVID-19 Immunity Task Force’s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n First, we would like to acknowledge how hard the COVID-19 pandemic has been for everyone \u2014 but especially for teachers and other classroom-based staff.<\/p>\n\n As we mentioned in an article about the study<\/a> on March 4, 2021, the main question guiding this research has been: Are teachers and other school staff being impacted during the COVID-19 pandemic in ways we don’t know or can’t yet see?<\/em> The intent of the study was to use sensitive serological (antibody) testing to identify whether school-based contact tracing was potentially missing any “silent” asymptomatic transmission.<\/p>\n\n The researchers began by seeking to determine the extent of silent SARS-CoV-2 transmission in the school environment, in a study that was one of three studies across Canada<\/strong> funded by the COVID-19 Immunity Task Force, with the other two in Quebec and Ontario.<\/p>\n\n