NY Times: Pandemic School Closures were Harmful and Useless

@no1marauder said
Misquoting actually.

Saying you can do Policy A without Adverse Consequence B IF Condition C (among others) is met, implies you shouldn't do Policy A IF Condition C is not met or you will get Adverse Consequence B. Here:

Policy A is reopening schools for in-person learning

Adverse Consequence B is an increased amount of a deadly, contagious cisease ...[text shortened]... oid a significant Adverse Consequence B IF Condition C is met. You keep ignoring that caveat.

Not misquoting. You seem to prefer alternate conclusions than what authors provide, and I admit i take their word for it when they write that learning mode was not an important variable determining community transmission rates.

Schools remained closed after those conditions you mentioned were met. It made no difference in transmission rates, as I think we agree. The benefit of remote learning on COVID transmission in these areas was non-existent (or if you squint while looking at the graph, maybe made a tiny difference). In places where conditions were not met, the reason why conditions were not met had nothing to do with schools.

This was very bad public policy. We have not even started discussing the cost.

@wildgrass said
Not misquoting. You seem to prefer alternate conclusions than what authors provide, and I admit i take their word for it when they write that learning mode was not an important variable determining community transmission rates.

Schools remained closed after those conditions you mentioned were met. It made no difference in transmission rates, as I think we agree. The bene ...[text shortened]... o do with schools.

This was very bad public policy. We have not even started discussing the cost.

No, I obviously don't agree that reopening schools for in-person learning in areas with existing high levels of COVID19 in the general population would have had no effect on transmission rates. It's quite obviously counterintuitive and the evidence (limited as it is as most local leaders weren't willing to adopt such a murderous, insane policy) is to the contrary. Even the studies you referenced don't make such an outlandish claim.

@no1marauder said
No, I obviously don't agree that reopening schools for in-person learning in areas with existing high levels of COVID19 in the general population would have had no effect on transmission rates. It's quite obviously counterintuitive and the evidence (limited as it is as most local leaders weren't willing to adopt such a murderous, insane policy) is to the contrary. Even the studies you referenced don't make such an outlandish claim.

Without data, you're just another person with an opinion...

Nature Medicine: "SARS-CoV-2 incidence rates were not statistically different in counties with in-person learning versus remote school modes in most regions of the United States."

PNAS: "...keeping lower-secondary schools open had minor consequences for the overall transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in society."

BMJ: "Most studies of school reopening reported that school reopening, with extensive infection prevention and control measures in place and when the community infection levels were low, did not increase community transmission of SARS-CoV-2."

You take what experts in the field have written and flip it to the negative and and add qualifiers, then say you disagree? This is why these debates never go anywhere, you read all these scientific studies and conclude the opposite because it's "counterintuitive" to you. You continue to cling to dogma, and downvote posts you are arguing with like a child.