Incomplete Data Makes School Reopening Perilous, Especially for Many Black and Brown Families
To date, U.S. data on how COVID-19 affects children has largely been guesswork, based on tiny samples that are chock-full of biases. National guidance on school reopening is based on this patchy data and is equally weak, providing no substantive insight on best practices to keep children safe. Americans need accurate information and valid analysis about how COVID-19 spreads, especially among children. Unfortunately, schools are reopening with neither.
One of the clearest examples of this problem is the recent CDC report stating that Hispanic children are 8x more likely — and Black children are 5x more likely — than white children to be hospitalized from COVID-19. Though it seems nearly certain that those different hospitalization levels were actually a result of many more Hispanic and Black children being infected with COVID than having had a more severe reaction after infection— this study, based on spotty data that did not include infection rates, caused a media field day. Outlets ran sensationalist headlines without regard for the holes in the data, further misinforming Americans as many parents make the tough decision about schooling this fall.
This post does what the media didn’t — analyzes the holes in children’s COVID data to teach us about what school reopening might look like.
To understand school reopening, we first must set a baseline for understanding children’s relationship with COVID. Ever since school shut down in April, American children have been the only segment of our society actually following the guidance of public health officials. Most of their social interactions have been closed and even a majority of parents have social distanced while having kids at home 24/7.
But not all parents have had the same choices, and this is where we can actually find real insights from the missing pieces.
Black and Brown Children’s Disproportionate Exposure to COVID-19 During Shutdown
Black and Brown children have been continually exposed long before the school reopening conversation began.
During the strictest months of quarantine, Black and Brown children were much more likely to be exposed to COVID-19 than white children, simply by the nature of their parents’ jobs and what we now know were higher infection rates in their communities. Just 16.2% of Hispanic parents and 19.7% of Black parents can safely telework, whereas 29.9% of white parents can.
“As some parents faced much higher risks of exposure, from being required to work outside the home during the pandemic, their children were indirectly exposed to the virus at similar rates.”
Mothers are especially exposed. 61% of Hispanic women work in service occupations or sales and office occupations — compared with 55 percent of Blacks, and 48 percent of Whites.
As certain groups of parents faced much higher risks of exposure from being required to work outside the home during the pandemic, their children were indirectly exposed to the virus at similar rates. Given that people are most at risk of contracting the coronavirus in their own homes, children whose parents are out working have always been at higher risk than children whose parents telework.
But as schools reopen and more workers return to their jobs, all children are now about to face similar exposure as Black and Brown kids did. Thus, what we saw with Black and Brown children during the shutdown is a good estimate for what we might expect to see with children from all racial groups once schools reopen. Sadly, it will likely only get worse for poor and minority children.
Risks of School Reopening
Now as schools reopen, Black and Brown children again face a higher risk of being exposed to the virus at school. With many schools adopting optional virtual learning, parents who work outside the home may be more likely to send their students back to school than parents who can work from home. This will increase the risk of infection for these children who will then be exposed both at home and school.
Here’s the breakdown of the vicious cycle:
These risks will be amplified by the social determinants that accompany public school distributions. Economically disadvantaged children, who are disproportionately Black and Brown, will be concentrated in under resourced schools. This will increase their relative risk compared to schools whose students have had less exposure at home.
Based on our insights from the holes in the data, these are the risks of school reopening. But we’ve got to move beyond a well-educated guess when it comes to understanding how COVID-19 affects children.
In the midst of school reopening, it is high time we identify holes in children’s COVID-19 data and create better data and better interpretations of the data. Not only for the Black and Brown children who are disproportionately affected, but for everyone. Because in a pandemic, your neighbors’ risk is your own.
As we have seen previously, unchecked COVID spikes in specific ethnic communities inevitably spread. And with so many school plans dependent on regional infection rates, a spike in a few schools will likely lead to all the surrounding ones being shut as well.
Better data is the only way that experts and public health leaders will be able to understand and efficiently intervene to protect children’s lives. Until we have that, we must be honest and more clear about what we know and do not. And we must acknowledge that while all children are at risk from COVID, certain schools and regions will face even higher risks than others because of the many social determinants of health.
Holes in the data aren’t just related to children. Read my other analyses here:
“Top 3 Things the U.S. Can Do Now To Better Fight COVID-19”
“Contextualizing COVID-19 Data to Better Mitigate Reopening’s Impact on Hispanic Communities”
“We Must Do Better: The CDC’s Misleading Data on Children, Race, and COVID-19”
