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While I clearly have the attention of teachers' union types who claim to care about science and facts, I'd like to use the opportunity to draw their attention to some recent writing of mine on the schools issue. See below:
An updated guidance report from Sick Kids hospital on school reopenings in Ontario is sounding the alarm on the “significant harms of school closure” and discusses the need to “reduce the fear and anxiety in parents and children/youth.” https://torontosun.com/news/provincial/new-sickkids-report-warns-of-significant-harms-of-school-closure/wcm/ee9663d2-7ce1-4cfa-b42f-19a58f5c9ba5/
The head of SickKids hospital is calling an increase of eating disorders in young people during the pandemic an “unprecedented crisis.” https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/pandemic-sent-eating-disorder-numbers-to-record-highs-sickkids
The detailed results of a testing pilot project conducted in Toronto public schools revealed that there is little undetected spread of COVID-19 occurring within classrooms and that parent-family positivity rates are much higher than that of students. https://torontosun.com/news/provincial/buried-toronto-schools-report-sheds-new-light-on-in-class-covid-data
The most common instance is that of a single reported case that does not go on to infect another class member or teacher. It’s this sort of data that has led many top health officials to say the virus is not spreading in the classroom: https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/furey-the-facts-still-show-covid-19-is-not-a-problem-in-canadian-schools
The expert who was paid by the ETFO made smaller class sizes the predominant back-to-school focus in his affidavit for them, which was also the ETFO's main lobby item *before* the pandemic. But the public should know this is not the primary concern of many paediatric specialists.
I would also like to mention that while teachers’ unions have been particularly awful in their actions of late, most parents would agree with me that teachers themselves have been doing a great job making the best out of a bad situation.
