Kids In Quarantine: "When in the history of mankind have we ever quarantined healthy people?”

A Chicagoland girls water polo team shuts down in April, leaving athletes home alone, while school leaders praise campus selection as vaccination site and push for more COVID-19 testing

(Photo Credit: Stevenson High School)

This is the first in a series titled “Kids in Quarantine” where The Kerr Report examines issues around public health policy and the quarantining of athletes. Due to the sensitive nature of the article’s topic, names of the subjects have been changed

On April 8, Mary got the call at work that all mothers dread in 2021.

My daughter is inside her school’s the nurse’s office in the middle of the day and is on speaker phone. This is not going be good.

Her daughter, Megan, a 16-year-old girls water polo player at Stevenson High School in suburban Lincolnshire, had a permission request for her mother.

Could she leave school alone?

The reason given to Mary by the school nurse is an all too familiar one in the school year of 2020-21—a player on the girls water polo team had tested positive for COVID-19. Megan would have to leave school grounds immediately and quarantine.

That afternoon, April 8, in a multi-part email obtained by The Kerr Report and sent to parents of the water polo team from Stevenson Athletic Director Tricia Betthauser and school nurse Patty Fiore, the scope of the quarantine was explained.

First this email from Fiore:

If your student attended water polo yesterday 4/7/21, they will be

required to quarantine for 14 days through 4/21/21. The first day they

can return to water polo/sports activities is on 4/22/21 provided your

student is without symptoms. The Lake County Health Department requires

a 14 day quarantine for all athletic activities. The quarantine period

can be shortened to 10 days with a negative test done 5-7 days after the

COVID positive exposure, but this will only apply to on campus learning.

The soonest your student can return to on campus learning is 4/19/2021

provided they are without symptoms and have had a negative test between

4/12/21-4/14/21. You can email test results, questions, and/or concerns

to nurses@d125.org

Then later that afternoon, an email from Betthauser:

As we continue navigating the COVID-19 pandemic, the safety of our

Stevenson community and open, transparent communication are our top

priorities. As such, we want to notify our Girls Water Polo families

that an individual in the water polo program has tested positive for

COVID-19.

The last day that this individual attended water polo

activities was Wednesday, April 7th. We would like to reassure you that,

as part of our commitment, we are taking every possible measure to

maintain the safety of our community.

The Stevenson nurses will reach out to the families of the athletes with

more information on next steps. In an abundance of caution, we ask at

this time that the athletes who were present for Tuesday or Wednesday's

JV and Varsity water polo activities quarantine until further notice.

We are confident that the mitigation strategies that have been put in

place provide a safe environment with a low risk of transmission.

However when a positive case is identified on campus, we will work

quickly to minimize the risk of exposures.

When Mary arrived home later that day, Megan explained to her something she didn’t understand: the email from the nurse stated how Megan had to remain home from school until April 19, provided she tested negative. But Megan could not resume water polo activities until April 22.

Why the disparate quarantine timeframes for in-person school and athletics? Why could she ‘test out of’ remote learning quarantine but not for water polo? When Mary asked her daughter, she couldn’t give an answer.

According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, a 14-day quarantine can end, “after Day 10 without testing and if no symptoms have been reported during any day of the daily monitoring period.” A 14-day quarantine can end after Day seven, “if a RT (Reverse Transcriptase)-PCR test is negative and if no symptoms were reported during any day of the daily monitoring period.”

Betthauser, in an interview, said school nurses are instructed to follow guidance from the Lake County Health Department’s “COVID-19 School Activities Toolkit.”

In the toolkit, updated on March 24, it states the following:

The Lake County Health Department, as of 2/8/21, is permitting a reduced option 10-day quarantine as long as the person remains asymptomatic and can continue to social distance and mask during days 11-14.

On the subject of athletic activities, the toolkit states:

Due to the inability to socially distance during sports, students/staff must stay out for the full 14 days from athletic activities

As for reducing the in-person school quarantine from 14 days to 10 days (a shortened quarantine for sports is not allowed according to the LCHD document) there is no PCR test requirement referenced in the LCHD document. It says how LCHD “is permitting a reduced option 10-day quarantine as long as the person remains asymptomatic.”

This is in contrast to the IDPH guidance that references an amended quarantine to seven days “if a RT (Reverse Transcriptase)-PCR test is negative and if no symptoms were reported during any day of the daily monitoring period.”

On April 12, Mary got on the phone with a representative of the Illinois Department of Public Health. She asked the representative about the varying quarantine timeframes and the PCR test requirement.

“That’s a school decision,” the representative told Mary.

Over the phone, the IDPH rep offered a piece of advice for Mary—be sure Megan does not leave the house for at least 10 days from the time her quarantine clock began, on April 8. It’s a matter of public health and Megan should not endanger the larger community by potentially exposing others to COVID-19, the IDPH rep explained.

Listening politely, Mary could barely control her outrage. She finally relented with a rhetorical question.

“When in the history of mankind have we ever quarantined healthy people?” Mary asked.

The IDPH rep could offer no answer. Mary broke the silence by saying, “that’s because we always quarantine the sick, not the healthy.”

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Like most public and private schools, Stevenson has a COVID-19 resource page on it’s district website (D125).

Each week, it publishes COVID-19 related data as new information comes in from the county (Lake) and state.

On the page, there is graphic referring to a “Swiss Cheese Model For Safety” to explain the school’s mitigation strategies.

Nowhere on the COVID-19 resource page, which touts the school’s commitment to “heath and safety” and transparency with Covid metrics, are any references to quarantines as a result of contact tracing policy.

In email communications obtained by The Kerr Report, school administrators direct parents to the school’s “Health and Safety Plan” when addressing matters of Covid. After the initial notification of a quarantine case, there is little, if any guidance as it pertains to quarantines. Emails refer to “next steps” and direct families to contact the school nurses with any questions.

While Stevenson officials provide minimal and often opaque communication on the subject of contact quarantines, when the topic turns to COVID-19 testing, the school’s messaging is consistent and clear.

In January, District 125 offered a hybrid learning model after being fully remote for the fall semester. Stevenson instituted rapid saliva testing for students and faculty for the second semester as a requirement for in-person learning and for all in-season athletes, including those that choose the remote learning option.

The first day students are on campus at the beginning of each school week, they must drop off a saliva sample at a designated location.

The process is described in this email from Betthauser:

(the ‘all caps’ portion is exactly how the email was written. In no other email exchange reviewed by The Kerr Report were words written in all caps)

AS A SPRING ATHLETE, IT IS A REQUIREMENT FOR YOU TO DROP OFF A

POPULATION TEST SALIVA SAMPLE ONCE A WEEK.

If you haven't submitted a sample yet this week, please drop off your

population tube before Wednesday at one of the inside drop boxes or at

the Port Clinton parking lot dropbox.

NOTE: IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A KIT OR YOUR LABELS ARE GONE, PLEASE CONTACT (name of supervisor)

When the COVID-19 vaccination roll out began earlier this year, Stevenson was chosen by the Lake County Health Department as a vaccination site. School administrators welcomed the selection, as D125 superintendent Eric Twadell told the Chicago Tribune in January:

Vaccination sites are not lemonade stands. You can’t just throw them up anywhere. You have to have (Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments) certification, you have to have the right medical team. If there are organizations out there that want to step up and be leaders, we would encourage them to contact the Lake County Health Department

What Twadell failed to grasp in his self-congratulatory remarks boasting of the school’s selection as a vaccination site, was the impact the optics of converting a large space of the school’s campus into a health care clinic would have on the larger school community, especially in the current climate of frequent close contact quarantines.

This mixed messaging—publicly promoting testing and vaccination for students while barely acknowledging or hiding the damaging reality of quarantined teenagers—has some parents questioning the priorities of school administrators, leading to feelings of frustration and exasperation.

“I thought high schools were supposed to be places of learning, not health clinics,” one Stevenson parent told The Kerr Report.

On its COVID-19 resource page, D125 publishes several statistical metrics related to COVID-19.

But there is no language or graphics referring to close contact quarantines.

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Five days into her quarantine, Megan received a message from Jeffrey Wimer, the Patriots water polo coach.

The notice, via the Remind app, stated that in order for athletes to return to in-person schooling, they were required to take a COVID-19 PCR test at the school’s testing site. Mary didn’t understand why the school was asking for a test several days before Megan was eligible to come out of in-school (4/19) and athletic quarantine (4/22). She agreed to have Megan take the test.

The next day, Megan got a call at home from a doctor informing her she tested negative for her weekly rapid saliva test. But that isn’t the sole reason for the call. Could Megan, the doctor asked, please reveal how many people she lived with and where are her parents at the time of the call? Megan answers that her parents are not in the room with her and that she’s been quarantining alone since April 8. That answer doesn’t satisfy the doctor, who followed up by asking if Megan and the rest of her family have taken the vaccine. Megan answers no. The doctor then asked Megan this question, “You’ll all be getting the vaccine, right?” Megan responds by saying, “we haven’t decided yet.”

Later after Mary returned from work, Megan relays to Mary the phone conversation she had earlier in the day with the doctor. Mary promptly calls Stevenson the next day with a few questions. When she got a school nurse on the phone, she wanted to know the following:

*why the school gave her daughter her test results over the phone but have not sent them to her or her husband?

*why hadn’t she received results for the additional PCR test requested by the school?

*and why was a doctor quizzing her daughter about vaccinations?

“For years, all we heard about was about HIPPA laws and privacy, and now, are they just non-existent?” Mary firmly asked one of the school nurse’s over the phone.

Later, one of the doctors representing Pedia Trust, the health care company that runs the school’s testing site, explained to Mary the reason they were asking questions about vaccination was in case “your daughter had an elderly person or immunocompromised person living at the home and if so, it’s extremely important that the person and all of those living at the home are vaccinated.”

Mary responded to the rep by saying she and her husband are familiar with the needs of the compromised and “frankly it’s none of your business if we are vaccinated or not and there are HIPPA laws protecting us.”

The representative apologized to Mary.

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When Megan was first ordered by Stevenson to quarantine, Mary’s husband expressed relief that the quarantine happened when it did and “they won’t have to worry about another one for the rest of the season.”

Mary explained to him how there is no limit on quarantines and how another positive test could trigger yet another shutdown.

On April 22, the Patriots returned to the pool after serving their full 14-day quarantine.

Mary told The Kerr Report how the quarantine has impacted the team this spring:

besides the overall mental and emotional health of these children already being damaged and fragile from being locked up and kept out of sports, school, etc.. for so long, the C-19 quarantine did enormous damage to the girls’ bond as teammates too. There is constant fighting/bickering between the Covid fearful and the others who are trying to get back to “normal”. The Seniors are so fearful that they’ll lose prom and graduation, along with their water polo season, that they’ve made a pact to do e-learning and stay home from school for the last six weeks of the year, because they don’t want to have all their Senior moments stolen from them. In the meantime, some other girls on the team are so happy and excited to be back in person at school that they’re “sneaking behind their teammates backs” (one senior included) and attending classes on campus. Think about that, they have to sneak into school!  It’s so disheartening and sad to see them bickering and fighting over being ‘selfish’ and ‘bad’ because they just want to do something as normal as go to school in person

On May 19, Stevenson begins the girls water polo postseason. The Patriots are a No. 1 seed in the Deerfield Sectional.

Prom (masked required) is scheduled for this Saturday, May 15. No dancing allowed.

On May 21, a “Spring Fling” is being held by the school where games will be played. “Live music” is advertised on the flyer.

Megan plans to attend Prom.

Mary wonders why no dancing is allowed at Prom while live music is promoted for the “Spring Fling” (will dancing be permitted there? Who the heck knows.)

When Mary drives down Circle Drive on the school’s campus and sees the “Covid Clinic” signs plastered on the entrance doors, telling students not to enter unless a “Covid Clinic” patient, she wonders why her daughter’s high school appears determined to position itself as a health care facility more than as an educational institution.

Over and over again, Mary finds herself saying the same thing under her breath.

“We can’t go through this again.”

Do you have a quarantine story you’d like to share with The Kerr Report? Send email to jonjkerr@gmail.com. Confidentiality will be protected upon request.