Backpacks loaded with excitement, uncertainty

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This article was published 07/09/2021 (1641 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Our kids are heading back into the classroom this week in grades one, four and seven. The two older girls are excited, mostly because they get to see their friends. I think they’re also feeling ready to head back because school — when it’s been in-class learning — has provided a sense of normalcy for them.

The youngest is nervous and has told us she doesn’t want to go back to school. She’s developed a steadfast clinginess to her father and me over the course of the pandemic. I don’t blame her, considering it started when she was four. A big chunk of her life — the formative years, as well as her entire school experience — have been spent in a weird state that teeters from absolute isolation to kind of normal. We’ve been her two pillars, and at times her only friends, when the rest of the world had to be locked out.

She has been so lonesome for friends. I think her anxiety will taper off when she’s back at school and back in her routine, and sees kids around her own age. I think she will enjoy being with her friends and teachers again. That’s my hope, anyway.

In a lot of ways, I can’t wait for the kids to go back at school. It is something that gives me a great sense of relief, but a sense that’s riddled with worry. My biggest concern at the moment is that my two younger kids, who aren’t old enough to be vaccinated, will get sick. Severe outcomes for children who have been infected with COVID-19 have been less common than for adults in previous waves of this pandemic. As the fourth wave moves in, unvaccinated people, including children, are most at risk of serious illness and death.

The Daily, a podcast by the New York Times, recently released an episode called Children and Covid: Your Questions Answered. Health and science reporter Emily Anthes answered questions from parents.

Anthes said that based on the data they have so far, most children — especially young ones — who catch COVID-19 have mild or even entirely asymptomatic cases. So far, she said, about 1 per cent of children who got infected with the virus ended up in the hospital, and 0.1 per cent ended up dying. However, scientists think it is possible the delta variant is causing more serious disease, she said.

Questions from parents included whether schools are safe.

“Schools can be safe when they take precautions, particularly when they take several different precautions,” Anthes said.

Implementing things such as physical distancing, mask mandates, daily symptom screening, regular testing programs and upgraded ventilation can make schools safe — even safer than the surrounding communities.

Last week, 12 Manitoba doctors penned a letter to provincial Health Minister Audrey Gordon urging the province to take action on five different recommendations in the face of the looming fourth wave.

“We have an absolute duty as a society to ensure the well-being of our children, and to that end keeping schools safe and open is an urgent priority,” they wrote. “Many children have already fallen behind in so many ways. We must take proactive measures to protect them and to keep schools open.”

The letter states Manitoba needs to urgently evaluate and remediate ventilation and filtration in classrooms. If air quality cannot be remediated, then contingency plans for alternative learning spaces need to be developed.

Gordon said the province is considering this and four other recommendations outlined in the doctors’ letter.

If you’ve got kids going back to school and you’ve got a whole range of conflicting feelings about it, you’re not alone.

shelley.cook@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @ShelleyAcook