Stop Needlesly Quarantining The Children!
So it finally happened to me. After hearing all Chol Hamoed from people in the community about how schools were contacting parents to inform them that their kids needed to quarantine for interactions that had occurred days before, my wife & I received a phone call on Thursday evening from the nurse of one of the local Yeshivot we send our children to.
We were told that one of our children was found to have been in "contact" with someone who had tested positive for Covid a couple of days prior but whose symptoms had started sometime on Shabbat. However, this "contact" potentially happened within 48 hours of the onset of symptoms so they were requiring our child to quarantine for the next 7 days (14 days from the contact).
To protect the privacy of the person who tested positive, I will not share any of the details of this "contact" other than to say that it happened 7 1/2 days before we got this phone call, it was for less than the 15 minutes that the CDC requires for quarantine, my child showed ZERO symptoms since the contact and there were other mitigating factors.
When we pointed this out to the nurse and asked if it was the determination of the DOH (Department of Health) that my child needed to quarantine, she admitted that it was not and in fact they had never even notified the DOH, but that the school's medical committee - out of an abundance of caution - decided that a quarantine was appropriate.
This my friends is EXACTLY what I was referring to when I wrote in my initial OpEd that we are "being machmir at the expense of our children". My wife and I immediately called our physician and reviewed the facts of the case with him. Given that it was already over 7 days since the exposure, the exposure itself did not meet any of the CDC guidelines and my child showed absolutely no symptoms, our doctor said that there was a better chance of my child being hit by lightning over the next 24 hours (and it wasn't supposed to rain) than that he/she would pass Covid onto anyone from that interaction.
But then our doctor said something incredible, and when you think about it so obviously true. You should go tell that school the following: "Out of an abundance of caution for xxx's social and emotional well-being, I have determined that xxx must not quarantine".
My wife and I conveyed this to the school and not surprisingly, it fell on deaf ears. So there you have it folks. A faceless and nameless committee who isn't accountable to anyone ruined my child's entire Yom Tov for absolutely no reason. And the committees of all of these schools collectively did it to dozens of kids in our community and to hundreds of children over the past month.
This isn't going to stop until people speak up and demand change. Gershon Distenfeld can keep on writing but that alone won't change things. We are all being sheep here. We are letting fear rule over rational thinking. We should all be demanding that we, the parents, in consultation with our own physicians should be making these decisions, not some arbitrary set of doctors that have no connection to our families, no context in which to evaluate the particulars of a child's social and psychological well being and no accountability to anyone.
But there's even a larger problem here. My child (and many others) had to sit home all Yom Tov instead of getting together with their friends as they had planned. But what about the majority of kids who were fortunate enough to have avoided the incidental Covid quarantine? They also were punished this year because of the insistence of our leadership to pursue "one size fits all" policies for our community that fail to appreciate the fact that this virus discriminates blatantly based on age. Our children didn't have a Simchas Torah this year. There were very few of them in Shul. It didn't have to be that way. If we don't reverse our mindset really soon, we will continue to harm the children, deprive them of experiences they deserve to have and even, potentially, drive them away from yiddishkeit.
Once again, history is not going to judge us kindly for what we are doing here. We are doing this to ourselves. The state is already requiring us to do more than is necessary. There isn't a single thing that our community is doing above state requirements that has proven to prevent the spread of the virus. Period. Let's stop with all the chumrahs. Let's get back to life as normal as much as possible, especially for the children. I know that's too big an ask given the polarization in the community and the extreme fear among some. But at the very least, can we stop quarantining the children for a risk that has a lower chance of happening than a person winning the lottery?
Sorry to hear this. Perhaps you can ask your doctor to speak with some of his or her colleagues and see if they are willing to write a letter to all the schools in Bergen County stating the reasons they feel it is important for a student's own physician to decide who and who does not need to quarantine.
ReplyDeleteThe irrational fear of people is taking over.
(It reminds me of the past situation with the measles. I also thought it was irrational then that if one child in a school did not get the measles vaccine bec their personal physician (not the school's physician) said it was dangerous for them to get it, the other parents felt this asymptomatic child (who was not near anyone who had the measles as there was no measles in their neighborhood) was going to come to school carrying the measles virus somehow and infect all the vaccinated children (who had a vaccine that supposedly for the extreme majority was supposed to protect them against the measles!).
You have hit upon the critical danger of these Covid Mandates: They have usurped your individual Medical Freedom and Replaced your personal Doctor who helps you make Personal health choices, with an out of control Health Bureaucracy that gets royalties and Consulting fees from Action Groups And Pharma. What we are experiencing is a Corrupt Health Bureaucracy being used by Leftist politicians to wield power and control. The astounding part is that this is happening on an international scale- the WHO, CDC, NIH, and Health Depts across the country and the world. Social media giants Google and Facebook are also a large part of the Fear Mongering and Misinformation campaign. At this point, many people have bought into the Covid Fear that compels them to not only give up their own Constitutional Civil and human rights And Freedoms, but also to Force and coerce others to do so, which accomplishes the goals of the Left.
ReplyDelete2/2 When I remind people that last year many people in my Shul sadly And tragically died- young and old- from various Illnesses, Health conditions, accidents, And even show them emails from previous year of the many deaths of Shul members and community members, they stare blankly. It is as though the Covid fear has spread a strange amnesia, where a child sneezing or “test positive“ will close a school, the same school where last year kids and adults had Pneumonias, Flus, Stomach flu, STAPH, Strep, Mono, Bronchitis, Enterovirus, Cancers, etc, etc, yet never even considered closing. And even the fact that Kids get Covid so mildly and then get Antibodies, does not stop the irrational quarantines, closures. If we are going to allow only one child to test positive to close a school, then open, then one child to test positive, then close, and on and on only letting one child at a time get antibodies, we could be doing this for the next 10 years.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the UNPRECEDENTED Prolong Mask Wearing has NOT BEEN TESTED on kids, nor shown to be safe for their Cognitive, Psychological or Social Development! No measurements have been taken of kids Blood Oxygenation after Hours 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, at school being Masked all day. Also ignored is the fact that with prolonged masking the kids’ mask gets Full of Snot, Spit and Germs.
To clarify the facts: The NJ DOH defines close contact as within 6 feet for 10 minutes of a COVID-19 positive individual during the infectious period (which includes the 2 days before symptoms begin, or the 2 days before a positive test in an asymptomatic person, and the following ten days or longer if symptoms persist). Regardless of when this information becomes available (even it if is already well within the 14 day quarantine period), individuals who meet the "close contact" definition should be notified and instructed to quarantine for the remainder of that period. Perhaps the physician you consulted with should familiarize her/himself with the NJ DOH guidelines.
ReplyDeleteIf this school has not been reporting to the NJ DOH, I recommend that you put your energy into encouraging them to do so.
To reiterate what you should already know: The importance of contact tracing is to keep exposed individuals home and safe and to have the heightened awareness that if an exposed individual become symptomatic to advise on testing and treatment expeditiously, while also preventing the spread of COVID-19 to others. While we all want our children in school, the risk of sending our children to school during a pandemic is not only the risk of contracting COVID-19, but also the risk of exposure to COVID-19 and the public health requirements that come with it.
A number of points:
Delete1) you are correct that the NJ DOH cites 10 minutes but they also link to the CDC website that says 15 minutes.
2) The actual exposure was around 10 minutes but there were other factors that did not qualify. The reason the school did not report it was because there DOH would not have recommended quarantine. The school admitted that they were the ones deciding to be stringent.
3) that’s all besides the point. Who are these faceless and nameless doctors to tell me what I need to do with my child? They can certainly decide that my kid can’t come to school but who ever heard of a doctor making a decision without examining a child? That’s insane. It’s for MY doctor to decide. My doctor after hearing all the facts not only decided that quarantining was unnecessary, but that it was in fact detrimental to my child’s mental health, something that a doctor that has never met my child couldn’t possibly determine. It’s a travesty what is going on here. It’s neither right nor ethical.
1) NJ DOH follows ten minutes so ten minutes it is
Delete2) There are no disqualifying factors to quarantine.
3) If you are referring to the joint medical board for the community day schools, then you know who these doctors are as their names were made available.
I think you may be misinformed regarding who makes a decision about whether a person should quarantine. This is a public health decision, not an individual's personal healthcare provider. You may want to reconsider your choice of healthcare provider as this one does not seem to be following guidelines and is actually putting you and your family at risk.
This virus has a cure - please take the time to read/watch this recent interview. Why is this cure not being promoted more widely? We do not need to have such a drastic fear about this virus.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/288940
You cannot make this up: https://www.emes.news/news/cuomo-government-restrictions-are-based-on-fear-not-science/
ReplyDeleteScientists are speaking up, and they don't believe in these lockdowns: https://www.bitchute.com/video/TnJ4osWH7Nxe/
ReplyDelete