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KDHE can help school districts with COVID-19 testing strategies


Posted Date: 09/17/2021

KDHE can help school districts with COVID-19 testing strategies

Kansas Department of Health and Environment officials have put together COVID-19 testing plans to help schools address the spreading pandemic.

Dr. Farah Ahmed, environmental health officer and state epidemiologist, said the goal of the COVID-19 testing strategy is to reduce outbreaks, keep school districts open and minimize absenteeism.

She and Dr. Joan Duwve, deputy state health officer, outlined the KDHE School Testing Plan during the first meeting earlier this week of the Safer Classrooms Workgroup.

KDHE can help districts in designing and implementing these strategies. The three major proposals are:

— Test to know: This is testing students, teachers and staff who become symptomatic during the school day or have had potential exposure to COVID-19.

— Test to stay and learn: Under this strategy, students remain in school by testing close contacts daily during their modified quarantine period.

— Test to stay, play and participate: Students can continue participating in activities outside school by testing at least weekly during a modified quarantine period.

School districts can use any of these strategies, or pieces of them.

KDHE has hired a team of 10 project specialists and project manager to directly support school districts. The $89 million to fund the program came from federal COVID-19 relief assistance.

Here is a link with more information on KDHE’s school-based testing program.

The Safer Classrooms Workgroup, composed of health care professionals and education leaders, will meet weekly at 1 p.m. Wednesday to provide information on mitigating the spread of COVID-19.

In starting the workgroup, Gov. Laura Kelly said, “We’ve got to do everything we can to keep our kids and our teachers and our staffs safe, but it’s also critical that we keep our kids in school, and not only for their academic education, but it’s also to give them the opportunity to develop those critical pyscho-social skills that they’re going to need to successfully navigate the world.”