Kids In Quarantine: "It's the principle of the whole thing...it's just wrong."
When Chicagoland softball team member quarantines after close contact on bus, school leaders and health officials can't clearly explain why, leaving questions, few answers and plenty of frustration
(Photo Credit: Huntley High School Softball)
This is the second in a series titled “Kids in Quarantine” where The Kerr Report examines issues around public health policy and the quarantining of student-athletes. Due to the sensitive nature of the article’s topic, names of the subjects have been changed
The bus ride was like any other for an April road game.
Mid-afternoon on April 27, the Huntley High School Red Raiders softball team climbed into the school bus to make the 21-mile ride south east to face conference foe St. Charles North.
There were about approximately 20 people on the bus. The athletes were all instructed to wear masks, the drive expected to take a little over a half hour.
It was early in the season and after a slow start, the Red Raiders, defending Class 4A state champions in Illinois, were playing better. Everyone wanted to compete, especially after missing the entire 2020 season due to COVID-19.
While on the bus to St. Charles North, Jennifer, a senior softball player, sits with her teammates. The girls talk about school, the season and upcoming prom and graduation for seniors.
Huntley, located about 50 miles northwest of Chicago in McHenry County, plays well and defeats the North Stars, 7-5 for its third win in a row.
The bus ride home is filled with excitement and jubilation over the victory and the possibilities of what lied ahead that season.
But for some players, the joy they felt early in the evening of April 27 soon flipped to despair.
Public health policy was about to rear its ugly head.
On its website, the Illinois Department of Public Health publishes a “Frequently Asked Questions” page. Every few months, IDPH will update the document to reflect new guidelines or changes in existing ones.
One of the questions on the FAQ page, No. 13, says this:
If a confirmed or probable COVID-19 case is identified in a classroom, or on a school bus, who will be considered close contacts that need to be quarantined? Will this include the entire classroom or all the students on the bus?
Before April 27, Amy Davis didn’t have the slightest idea about question No. 13 on the IDPH FAQ page, last updated March 16.
But after the events of April 27 day, she had to become educated very quickly.
Her daughter, Jennifer, had sat two rows behind a teammate on the bus who later tested positive for COVID-19. Jennifer had been labeled a close contact and would have to be quarantined from school and softball for 14 days.
"How these kids have been ripped away from their freedom,” Amy said.
Her frustration with the situation was only beginning.
After the school phone call confirming the quarantine, Amy began doing some independent research.
She reached out to the McHenry County Department of Public Health. An official there said they had no record of the case resulting in Jennifer’s quarantine.
Why would the health department not know?
Amy reviewed the MCDPH website, looking for information to verify what she had been told by the Huntley school nurse. She found the IDPH FAQ page and looked over Question No. 10 that asked “Who is a close contact?”
One section of the answer stated this:
Close contacts to a confirmed case of COVID-19 are required to remain in quarantine at home for 7, 10 or 14 calendar days starting from the last day of contact with the confirmed case
This section made Amy more confused.
Why was the school dispensing the maximum 14-day quarantine when there are less restrictive options available?
On the IDPH FAQ page, a question about quarantining yielded this answer:
IDPH, along with CDC, continues to recommend a 14-day quarantine. However, based on local circumstances and resources, CDC has provided options to reduce quarantine that local health departments (LHDs) may implement using symptom monitoring and diagnostic testing.
Option 1: Quarantine period is for 10 calendar days after the close contact’s last exposure to the COVID-19 case. Date of last exposure is considered Day 0. The individual may end quarantine after Day 10 if no symptoms of COVID-19 developed during daily monitoring. SARS-CoV-2 PCR testing is recommended and may be required by the local health department. Can maintain social distancing and masking at all times when returning to school.
A check of CDC guidelines found the same; a 10-day quarantine recommendation.
So again, why the 14 days? With what agency guidelines were the school consulting? Amy was desperate for a clear answer because the extra four days between 10 and 14 was hugely important in the life of Amy’s daughter.
May 8 was prom night at Huntley. Last year’s dress remained unworn in Jennifer’s closet (2020 prom was cancelled due to Covid.)
“It (May 8) will only be day 12 of a 14 day quarantine,” Amy said. “If it were 10 days she’d be able to go. It’s the only prom she’s ever had.”
And there was still the confounding and conflicting issue of how Huntley and the health department interpreted contact tracing rules on the school bus.
The guidance on the IDPH FAQ’s page stated, “A possible approach to identifying close contacts on a bus would be to include persons who sat 3 rows in front and 3 rows behind the confirmed or probable COVID case.”
Jennifer was sitting two rows back from her COVID positive teammate the afternoon of the St. Charles North game. Huntley officials said they were just “following the guidance” in quarantining her.
But the recommendation also states how on a bus, exposure includes the standard ‘six feet, 15 minutes,’ commonplace in all public health guidance. If so, on the April 27 bus ride, why were athletes sitting diagonal across from the infected player not also quarantined? They were surely seated closer than Jennifer yet were exempt.
Amy needed answers and finally got on the phone with Huntley Superintendent Scott Rowe on the morning of May 2.
Rowe told Amy they had been in touch with the McHenry County Health Department and Susan Karras, the department’s Public Health Nursing Director. Rowe stated how Karras was acting as a liaison between the health department and county school districts.
(The Kerr Report repeatedly made requests for comment to Rowe and Karras. The requests went unanswered by publication of this article.)
Amy had one specific issue to address with Rowe—the public health guidance specific to school buses says how ‘a possible approach to identifying close contacts on a bus would be to include persons who sat 3 rows in front and 3 rows behind the confirmed or probable COVID case.” Yet the same guidance also states how ‘exposure on a bus must include everyone who sat within 6 feet…for 15 minutes or longer.’ These two pieces of guidance are not the same.
Which one is the school using?
“That’s where this whole problem has come into,” Amy said. “Which one is it?”
On the phone, Rowe told Amy how Karras told him that the McHenry County Department of Public Health doesn’t use the six foot radius but the three rows forward, three back and “the seat next to” the infected person (‘next to’ is a Huntley addition to existing protocols as there is no reference to ‘next to’ in the IDPH FAQ page.)
Exasperated, Amy asked Rowe how could this make sense to anyone? And what about the email she had from a health official stating to use the guidance as written in the IDPH FAQ? Why were they interpreting the very rules they were stating should be followed as written?
Rowe mentioned to Amy something about the airlines and how MCHD was taking cues from a recent change in that industry regarding the close contacts and rows of seats.
Before hanging up, Rowe said he would look into the situation more and someone would get back to her.
But the call only raised more questions than answers.
Amy thought about the conversation she had with another parent on the team. The parent had gotten an MCHD official on the phone who said quarantines can be revised from 14 days to 10 days or even seven. It was up to the school to amend quarantines, not the health department, the parent told Amy that is what she heard from the MCHD official (Amy heard of a situation at Burlington Central, a team in Huntley’s conference, where a positive test triggered contact quarantines. But those players were able to return short of 14 days.)
“As long as they have no symptoms and take a (PCR) test they can go back,” Amy said she was told by the parent. “Each school is allowed to make their own decision.”
If true, why do Huntley officials insist they can’t budge off 14 days?
“It’s not even day 14 it’s day 15,” Amy said. “Why can’t they go back at 3:00 pm Tuesday (May 11), which is 336 hours past exposure. I’m getting really down to the minute here.
“But if it were day 10 she could go to prom. And she would not miss any more softball. It’s the principle of the whole thing….it’s just wrong.”
Due to pick up her cap and gown for graduation day, May 22, Amy told Jennifer she’d take care of it.
“I’m not taking a chance of someone saying, ‘oh, no, she stood there for 15 minutes and now she can’t go to graduation,’” Amy said.
On April 30, D158 Superintendent Rowe sent a letter to parents.
The beginning of the letter said the following:
As we near the end of the school year, our staff, students, and much of our community have had their spirits lifted by the resumption of many school, extracurricular, and athletic activities. However, along with these changes has come greater exposure to the COVID-19 virus. As a result, we have seen increases in the need for isolation and quarantines among our student body, particularly at the high school.
This situation illustrates the importance of continued vigilance and vaccination within our community.
The letter goes on to include multiple references to the COVID-19 vaccine and links to locations where students age 16 and under can get dosed.
“Students who are fully vaccinated do not need to quarantine as a result of being a “close contact” with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19,” the letter went on to say.
Nine schools make up Huntley Community School District 158, including Huntley High School. The district has a metrics dashboard webpage that publishes updated COVID-19 testing and quarantine data.
According to the dashboard page, as of May 25 (the most current data before this article was published), the number of students district-wide in either quarantined or in isolation was 86. The 14-day average number is 114 students, split equally between those in isolation and those in quarantine.
(The CDC defines ‘isolation’ this way: “…keeps someone who is sick or tested positive for COVID-19 without symptoms away from others, even in their own home.” It recommends asymptomatic people whom test positive for COVID-19 “stay home until after 10 days have passed since your positive test.”)
The same metrics dashboard page lists the number of HHS students whom have tested positive for COVID-19 over the previous 14 days as five.
There is no statistic on the dashboard page that lists the number of in-person school days lost to students due to contact quarantines or isolation.
Rowe, in his emailed letter to families, also wrote this:
While we do not anticipate an end to the realities of our current situation anytime soon, we know that the best way to speed the end of these challenges is to reduce spread in the community. This includes vaccinating as many eligible individuals as possible.
The messaging pitch from D158 leaders to its parents and students is a consistent one—inflexible on quarantines, persuasive on vaccinations.
On the night of HHS prom May 8, Jennifer finally got to put on her dress and went out to dinner with friends. She was not allowed at the official on campus prom event (held in the school gymnasium) as her quarantine, never reduced, did not end until a few days later.
Even after her quarantine expired, Jennifer chose not go back to the high school, finishing her final school days at home in her room. She did attend graduation on May 22 and is back playing softball for a Red Raiders team that earned a No. 3 sectional seed in the 2021 state playoff series.
(Photo Credit: Huntley Softball)
Amy saved a picture on her phone. She took it while her daughter was stuck at home for those 14 days. The photo is of Jennifer, the one who wanted to be in the classroom for second semester senior year, her teachers thrilled to have her back so they could conduct exercises that can best be learned in physical space and not over Zoom, the photo taken in the middle of the afternoon when Jennifer should have been in school, excitedly wrapping up her classes and getting ready for softball, but instead, the picture shows Jennifer doing something entirely different.
She’s taking a nap with her open laptop next to her.
“I almost sent it to the school principal but thought (twice about it) and didn’t do it,” Amy said. “But I wanted to tell them, ‘this is what happens when you unnecessarily quarantine a child.’”
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh good stuff!!