It may take many, many more vaccine mandates to end the Covid-19 pandemic, Fauci says

Sep 13, 2021

As for safety concerns, all students and teachers returning to school on Monday will be required to wear masks and the city previously announced a vaccine mandate for all public school employees with no testing opt out.

Last week, New York Mayor Bill De Blasio announced 72% of teachers are vaccinated and 65% of students 12-17 years old have had at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.

On Friday, the United Federation of Teachers said in a statement, that an independent arbitrator decided teachers who have documented or religious exemptions must be offered a non-classroom assignment.

In some parts of the country, a return to campus has coincided with a surge in pediatric cases.

At Texas Children's Hospital, Versalovic said, "We continue to be on a high plateau.

The reality is we may be headed to another peak -- or another valley if we all pull together."

Gottlieb said even though Covid-19 case rates may be declining in some older age groups, "the one age category where it's continuing to increase is in school-aged children."

Putting students in "pods" in schools and routine asymptomatic testing can help reduce transmission, Gottlieb said.

"Rather than quarantine that whole classroom, you just test them in a serial fashion to make sure that you didn't have an exposure that led to a downstream case and so you can actually use testing to prevent quarantines." Gottlieb said during an Axios event Friday.