The American Academy of Pediatricians has lent its considerable weight to the mounting pressure to reopen schools. Their President even joined the Trump and Devos press conference—at the same time that Trump is saying the CDC guidelines are “too stringent”. If anything has made clear that this push is more about the economy than it is about kids, and that there is no commitment to making our schools safe, it is this.
But there’s also a lot of confusion about what is safe and how much risk there is. There’s also real concern about the impact of school closures on our kids and their emotional and mental well-being. That’s what makes the AAP guidelines so dangerous. They tell us what we already know about the importance of schools for kids’ development. But they also minimize the very real risks of opening schools in the context of surging cases of coronavirus.
I wrote a detailed analysis of the problems with the AAP guidelines in a piece published on Medium. If you didn’t see it, or you were blocked by a paywall, here is a link to a free version of the story.
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