It’s been four years since COVID-19 started its disruptive and deadly spread across the world, causing a pandemic that nobody could have guessed would rage on for this long. A lot has changed since its discovery in December 2019 and the declaration of a worldwide health emergency in March 2020. We all banded together to support essential workers and protect each other with physical distancing and delayed visits, and later face masks and vaccinations. Yet, since about the two-year mark of the pandemic, many started to give up the fight and let COVID-19 win. The tweet below seems as pertinent today as it did at the time.
Two major groups of people will be trying to gaslight you into doing nothing to fight COVID.
— T. Ryan Gregory (@TRyanGregory) April 12, 2022
OhWellians: there's nothing we can do, give up, we're all going to get it.
AllsWellians: The worst is past us, pandemic is almost over, back to normal.
Here we are now on the last day of 2023 and COVID-19 levels have reached another huge “wave” based on wastewater data, nearly the same levels as two years ago when the Delta and the original Omicron variants surged around the world. So many people are reporting being infected for the first time, and sadly our household has fallen into that category this year.
We had our household’s first case back in late November. Our youngest attends a home daycare, where one of the other children’s parent had contracted COVID-19 from their teaching job at a public school. While the other child tested negative and was allowed to return, the daycare provider still caught it from the other child and unknowingly passed it on to our child. We tested our child for three days until a positive test appeared, but thankfully there were no symptoms. It lasted 11 days! No symptoms and testing positive. We were lucky to have had the advanced knowledge of a possible infection and the ability to test daily. Nobody else caught it: we had stopped the spread.
Our household’s second case came five days later when our eldest complained of symptoms – nausea and headache – in the middle of the school day and had to come home. Then the fever came and fatigue hit, which thankfully only lasted the weekend. This infection most certainly came from school, despite our child diligently wearing a mask indoors (one of only a handful): except at eating time, where it’s a free-for-all for infectious disease to spread through the classroom. Tests returned positive for eight days and a week of school was missed, plus two family gatherings. We were lucky again to have caught it before infection spread at home. For a second time, nobody else caught it: we had stopped the spread again!
Third time was the charm for COVID-19. We all tested before a Christmas Eve dinner with extended family, all negative. Christmas Day was spend at home. On Boxing Day, we went to see the same family for brunch and gifts, and figured since we had just tested on the afternoon of the 24th, there was no need to test again. When we got home on the afternoon of the 26th, our other school-age child (who also diligently masks indoors) started to have a sniffly nose, and a couple hours later a sore throat: bingo, another postive test result. This case was asymptomatic until it was too late, as both us parents caught it and are now suffering the effects of COVID-19. Thankfully, we did not spread it to any of the extended family!
We just hope and pray that there are no long-term effects for any of our family: thankfully we all had the XBB vaccination in October and this has likely lessened the severity of our infections. We are now missing out on more visits with family and friends, at a time of year when it is usually our only chance to see certain people. COVID-19 has virtually cancelled Christmas for us this year.
The key takeaway here is that schools are the primary source of infection, and yet nobody with any responsibility wants to do anything about it. The simple act of requiring masks in schools would go a long way toward preventing the spread of COVID-19, influenza, and other cold viruses. Thankfully, classrooms have been (or at least are supposed to be) running HEPA filters, which may be why we made it so far into the year without an infection. Schools also need to start tracking absences due to testing positive for COVID-19 and reporting on an aggregate basis: this would give parents the knowledge to take proper precautions to prevent the spread of disease.
In 2024, let’s find our sense of community and caring for one another once again. Wear a mask whenever you are in a public space, whether you feel sick or not. I can tell you from personal experience that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can be isolated with simple solutions such as testing, proper ventilation, cleaning the air, and wearing masks. We have the tools and the knowledge: let’s use them!
