When Should Schools Close For Coronavirus?
The spread of coronavirus has compelled hundreds of K-12 schools in the U.S. to close, affecting more than 750,000 students, according to an analysis by Education Week. And those numbers are certain to increase in the coming days, as concerned parents call for more school closures.
The growing health crisis presents school leaders with a painful choice. Closing schools — as has been done, so far, in China, Japan, Italy and elsewhere — is a proven measure that has been shown to slow the spread of disease and, in turn, save lives. But it also causes huge economic and social disruption, especially for children, millions of whom depend on the free and reduced-cost meals they get at school.
Public officials understandably don't want to close schools unless they absolutely have to, and many closures so far have been triggered by a known case of infection or exposure among staff or students. Yet research suggests the best time to close schools is before that happens.
"If you wait for the case to occur [in your school], you still have wound up closing the school, but now you've missed the opportunity to have the real benefit that would have accrued had you closed the school earlier," says Yale University sociologist and physician Nicholas Christakis.
"It's sort of closing the barn door after the cow is gone."
Christakis' Yale lab normally studies how humans spread everything from ideas to behaviors to germs, but he says he's now all-in studying how coronavirus might spread. Aside from developing a vaccine and getting everyone to wash their hands thoroughly, closing schools is one of the most effective things a community can do to slow contagion, says Christakis, author of Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society. But timing matters. He points to studies of the 1918 Spanish flu, which suggest some cities may have saved lives by deciding to close schools earlier.
"Closing the schools before anyone in the schools is sick is a very difficult thing to do," Christakis acknowledges, "even though it's probably extremely beneficial and much CONTINUE READING: The Case For And Against Closing Schools Over Coronavirus : NPR