A hundred students and staff quarantined two days after resuming in-person learning

Escondido County official says cases 'not overly encouraging'

About a hundred students and teachers were ordered to quarantine two days after they returned to classrooms in San Diego.

The situation emerged on Thursday across four elementary middle schools in San Diego’s Escondido Union School District, raising further concerns around Covid-19 and safety.

Students only returned to classroom-learning on Tuesday, after months spent learning online, and were divided into separate cohorts, studying at different times throughout the day, to avoid any transmission on-campus - in addition to on-site temperature checks.

But, according to the Escondido County School District covid dashboard, 10 students who returned to classrooms on Tuesday afterwards tested positive, causing almost a hundred students and staff to quarantine. They have since returned to distance learning.

Dr Luis Rankins-Ibarra, the school district’s superintendent, said in a statement to CNN that “Covid cases and quarantines were not unexpected” despite them coming "so early in the reopening” process.

“Any time you get one case, of course, it’s alarming," he added, in separate remarks reported by NBC News San Diego. "But we’ve got protocols in place and the quarantines occur as a precautionary measure."

The superintendent said he believed the positive cases were brought on to campuses from the community, where cases remain high, but stressed the return to schools was based on a recent downwards trend in cases and hospitalisations.

San Diego currently ranks in California’s strictest coronavirus tier, with some 244,000 reported cases and 2,800 deaths since the pandemic started, CNN reported.

"Our city struggles with a high case rate, and our community includes many multi-generational families. This makes for a challenging environment," said Dr Rankins-Ibarra.

"It is unfortunate that individuals still come to campus while they are awaiting Covid test results or after having close contact with someone who is positive, or while they are feeling ill," he added.

Romero Maratea, the president of Escondido Elementary Educators Association, added in comments to NBC News San Diego that “Our primary concern is for the safety of students, families and staff, some of which have already lost loved ones to the virus.”

"The second concern is whether a return to campuses is sustainable. Parents and staff have voiced strong concern regarding the ‘on-again-off-again’ scenario which has played out in our district. The numbers since live teaching and learning resumed this week are, unfortunately, not overly encouraging, and we must always remember that numbers represent real people,” he added.

The impacted schools this week were Farr Avenue Elementary, Pioneer Elementary, Rock Springs Elementary, and Mission Middle School, according to the district, which has 8,700 students across 23 campuses.

There was also one positive case among the maintenance and operations department, which led to four people being told to quarantine.

The quarantines will last 10 days, having recently been reduced from two weeks by health authorities, NBC San Diego reported.