Fifteen employees of Miami school system die from coronavirus in 10 days

School began again on 23 August, unconfirmed if staff contracted virus before classes started

Fifteen employees of the Miami-Dade County Public Schools District have died from Covid-19 in the past 10 days, officials told a local news outlet.

Sonia Diaz, a spokesperson for several unions in the school district, confirmed the number of deaths to South Florida’s NBC6.

Public schools in the county resumed classes on 23 August. It is not known when those who passed away contracted the virus.

Despite the surge in Covid-19 cases, Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill earlier in the year banning vaccine passports and used his executive power to prohibit schools from enforcing mask mandates on students.

School districts are challenging this ban and the governor has hit back by threatening to withhold salaries of officials who defy him.

Mr DeSantis, who has been against most coronavirus prevention measures since the beginning of the pandemic, also used his executive power to end all local emergency mandates requiring indoor masking in businesses.

The state also plans to begin issuing $5,000 fines for any business, school, or government agency that requires customers or visitors to show proof they have been taken the coronavirus vaccine. That will come into effect on 16 September.

The more transmissible Delta variant of Covid-19 is raging out of control in Florida, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

There have been 129,000 cases recorded in just the last seven days, bringing the state’s total since the start of the pandemic to more than 3.3 million cases, or 15.4 per cent of the population. By contrast, New York, which has a similar population, has one-third fewer total cases.

A teachers union confirmed on Wednesday that three of the 15 deaths were educators. Karla Hernandez-Mats, the president of the United Teacher of Dade, told NBC6 that it appears the teachers got sick before the start of the school year but is still waiting to confirm that. They were not vaccinated.

“I can tell you that these were phenomenal human beings. These are people that dedicated their lives to serving our community,” Ms Hernandez-Mats said.

One of the educators that lost their life to Covid-19 was Abe Coleman, a teacher for more than 30 years, who passed away on Tuesday aged 55, NBC6 reports. He leaves behind a wife and son.

Mr Coleman was also a mentor and site director for the 5000 Role Models of Excellence Program, overseeing the Holmes Elementary location. The organisation mentors minority men in Miami-Dade and he is said to have helped shape the lives of hundreds of young men over the years.

Congresswoman Fredricka Wilson, the founder of 5000 Role Models and a former teacher, released a statement paying tribute to Mr Coleman. She described him as a “highly motivated, dedicated, and inspirational Site Director for the Holmes Elementary Role Models Chapter and never missed a day”.

“We’re going to be grieving for a while,” Ms Hernandez-Mats said. “As a teacher, I have to make sure the message is that we’re teaching our community to be safe, to continue to socially distance, to wash your hands, but please, get vaccinated.”

The identities of the other teachers or staff members have not been released.