Will Plymouth-Canton students & staff need to mask up?

If he were alive right now, Don Lucas would be “kicking and screaming” to encourage the Plymouth-Canton Community Schools district to require children and staff to wear masks when school begins September 7, Lauren Lucas says.

But her husband, a beloved high school substitute teacher and security guard in the district for years, isn’t here to do it.

He died of COVID-19 in November, at the age of 64, when vaccines against the disease weren’t yet available. Lauren Lucas didn’t get to see him during the three weeks he was hospitalized, and had to approve the decision to withdraw life support over the phone.

Now, she has joined a growing number of community members, including parents and grandparents of the district’s 17,000 students, to call for the district to follow the Centers for DIsease Control and Prevention’s guidance for K-12 schools. That guidance calls for masks be worn by all inside school buildings, regardless of vaccination status.

“I’m my husband’s voice now. I also had COVID, and I’m still struggling with its effects,” Lauren Lucas says. “This is serious. I never want a family to go through what we went through.”

National, state and district guidelines

The CDC guidance for schools was updated in late July because of new knowledge about the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. In addition to the guidance for schools, CDC offers a page for parents about what to expect in schools this year.

A number of Michigan public school districts, colleges and universities have already decided to require masks indoors, as shown on a statewide map compiled by parents.

The P-CCS COVID-19 Mitigation Guidelines, released August 3, recommend the use of masks but do not require them. The guidelines cite the CDC and state health department guidance as their basis.

However, the state’s chief medical executive, Dr. Joneigh Khaldun, has said that districts must have universal masking in order to be following CDC guidance.

The P-CCS plan says leadership will consult with the Wayne County Health Department about requiring masks when the CDC’s map of county-level COVID activity shows Wayne County has Substantial spread. The county reached that milestone on August 4, and is shown in orange on CDC’s map as a result.

In addition to its recommendation for K-12 schools, which applies no matter what color a county is on the national map, CDC recommends masks in indoor public places for everyone over the age of 2 living in or visiting a county that is orange or red on the map, whether they are vaccinated or not. Major employers such as the Big 3 automakers have begun mandating workplace masks as a result, and major retailers have begun requiring them for employees, or for employees and customers alike.

CDC does not have the power to mandate mask requirements by school districts, except for mask use on school buses, which P-CCS is following.

The state health department has also issued guidance calling on schools to follow CDC guidance regarding masks and other measures, but has not issued a public health order that would require masks in schools statewide. County public health departments also hold the power to issue public health orders.

Gabriela Islas, parent of an incoming P-CCS 2nd grader, 4th grader and high school freshman, says she supports requiring masks indoors to protect kids, especially because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has not yet approved a vaccine for children under the age of 12. She has signed a petition to call for the district to follow CDC guidance.

“We have young children who cannot get vaccinated yet, and it worries me that despite all our efforts to keep our kids safe, someone sick may still come to school unmasked and infect others,” she says. “The best analogy I can think of is drinking and driving — I can be the best driver and not drink and drive, but I can still get injured or even killed by someone who does. Only if we all work together to stay safe, then we can all really achieve what our main goal should be — safe in-person school.”

Vaccine availability and effects

Clinical trials to test COVID-19 vaccines in children under 12 and determine the appropriate dose are now under way, and companies would then submit their data to the FDA for consideration of an approval.

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is already approved for everyone age 12 and up, and is available for free in pharmacies, clinics and pop-up locations nationwide. Those between the ages of 12 and 18 need a parent or guardian’s permission to receive it in Michigan.

All three vaccines approved for use in the United States have proven highly effective in preventing symptomatic cases of COVID-19 in the groups they are approved for, and preventing hospitalization and death. CDC’s data tracking site shows that as the percentage of people in an age group who are vaccinated goes up, the rate of cases among people in that age group has gone down.

However, some teens and adults may be less protected by the vaccines due to conditions or medications that alter their immune system. The FDA is considering whether to recommend booster shots for them.

Before vaccines became available to adults and teens, older adults had much higher rates of COVID-19 than children. But in recent months, as the majority of older adults have gotten at least partly vaccinated, case rates have been higher among children and teens than among older adults.

While COVID-19 does not typically affect children as severely as it does older adults and those with compromised immune systems, several children’s hospital leaders in states where COVID activity is higher than Michigan have issued public statements about the number of severely ill children they are treating.

If vaccines are approved by the FDA for children under 12, parents will be able to choose whether to have their child vaccinated.

Until that time, and until case rates of COVID-19 decline, mask-wearing in indoor locations, and continued efforts to encourage vaccination of everyone over the age of 12, are considered key tools for preventing the spread of the virus.

Lucas, Islas, and others in the grassroots effort know that there are those opposed to requiring masks in schools as long as CDC recommends them.

“Making masks optional would be a very irresponsible way to bring kids back to in-person school, especially with the Delta variant quickly surging throughout the country,” says Islas. “Do we need to wait until all our hospitals are full to protect our kids? By that time, it may just be too late.”

Lucas, who has decided to postpone her husband’s memorial service once more because of rising COVID activity, agrees.

“I feel like I’m living in the Twilight Zone. I wonder, how could you take a chance with your own kid? And why would you not protect somebody else? It’s not going to hurt you or your child to put a mask on,” she says. “This isn’t politics, this is a community health crisis. We need to teach our kids that in life you have to do some things that aren’t comfortable, for the good of everyone.”

Disclosure: The author of this piece is a member of the grassroots effort to call on P-CCS to follow CDC guidance, and is participating in that effort as an individual, not as a representative of her employer.