One employee of Durango School District 9-R tested positive for COVID-19 among 600 district personnel tested last week.
Superintendent Dan Snowberger said the person who tested positive initially came down with the virus in July, recovered and developed antibodies, but the employee is among a small number of people who still test positive for the virus even after recovering and forming antibodies.
The employee, who is a member of the district’s support staff, was quarantined again after the test, but has been cleared as noncontagious and safe, Snowberger said.
“The employee initially tested positive in early July and has quarantined but still tested positive when we administered tests. There’s a small sliver of the population that seems to just continue to test positive even after forming antibodies,” Snowberger said.
Contact tracing was done, and no one else was determined to need quarantining based on contact with the employee, Snowberger said.
“Six hundred people were tested, and we had one positive case. I think that that’s good news,” he said. “I think we can say to our community we will be sending our kids into a safe environment.”
The first defense in protecting schools from the novel coronavirus will be for families to dutifully check their children for COVID-19 symptoms daily and then fill out 9-R’s online self-certification form, Snowberger said.
Children exhibiting symptoms of the virus – fever above 100.4 degrees, chills, loss of taste or smell, persistent cough or shortness of breath or breathing difficulty – are not allowed at schools and should be kept home.
The self-certification form is expected to appear on the 9-R’s website by the end of the day Friday.
“Really, the key for us is for parents to strictly adhere to self-certification. And if in fact their child has any symptoms, to keep them at home,” he said. “In the end, that’s going to prevent them from needing to leave work to come get their child,”
The district plans to reach out to business groups and major employers to alert them that parents may have to take more sick days this year and to be lenient in allowing parents days off to care for their children.
Pre-COVID-19 practices, such as sending children to school with minor running noses or slight coughs, could only further increase risk for transmission of the novel coronavirus this year, Snowberger said.
The district is also working with primary care physicians to ensure rapid COVID-19 testing during the school year.
9-R is working with Cedar Diagnostics, a Durango medical laboratory, to provide nasal swab tests for the virus, and 9-R is working with Cedar so school nurses and other district medical personnel can administer the tests at schools.
The district’s contract with Cedar Diagnostics guarantees it will have a test available within 24 hours of a request, and results are expected back in 36 to 72 hours, Snowberger said.
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment has issued a flow chart for school districts that offers guidance about how to handle students who show up at school exhibiting COVID-19 symptoms, and it will be followed by 9-R.
The school district has also developed a flow chart for parents that guides them on proper protocols for dealing with children who are exhibiting symptoms and plans to place it on its website.
parmijo@durangoherald.com
9-R Flow Chart COVID-19 Cases (PDF)
