President Joe Biden said on Sunday that children need to return “safely” to school and that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will release “science-based” guidelines later this week on requirements for schools reopen amid the ongoing pandemic.
The president’s comments were made during a pre-Super Bowl interview on “CBS Evening News”. Asked by anchor Norah O’Donnell whether about 20 million American children had not been in the classroom for nearly a year – and the damage to mental health it caused – constituted a “national emergency”, Biden said yes.
The president said he thought it was time for schools to reopen “safely” under certain guidelines.
“You need to have fewer people in the classrooms. You need to have ventilation systems that have been reworked,” said Biden. “Our CDC commissioner is going to come out with a science-based trial, I think as early as Wednesday to establish what the minimum requirements are.”
ARCHIVE: President Joe Biden talks about the economy in the White House state dining room in Washington.
(AP)
The president failed to mention, however, that the CDC guidelines on reopening schools have been available for months. In mid-September – almost two months before the 2020 presidential election – the agency launched “Indicators for Decision Making in Schools”.
The recommendations created a five-level risk assessment based on the number of new cases per 100,000 people in the previous 14 days and the percentage of positive rates over the same period.
The CDC said that a school falling into a “medium”, “high” or “highest” risk category does not necessarily mean that the school should not reopen for face-to-face learning, only that the school should use “alternative learning models” as a hybrid learning.
Last month, the federal agency said in a report that there is “little evidence that schools have contributed significantly to increasing transmission in the community”.
And last week, CDC principal Rochelle Walensky told reporters at a news conference: “There is growing data that suggests schools can be reopened safely and that safe reopening does not suggest that teachers need to be vaccinated to reopen. The vaccination of teachers is not a prerequisite for the safe reopening of schools. ”
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Requested on Thursday to respond to Walensky’s comments, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the CDC director was speaking “in her personal capacity”.
“Obviously, she is the head of the CDC. But we will wait for the final guidance to be able to use this as a guide for schools across the country,” said Psaki. “[Biden] believes that even with vaccinations for teachers or for any American, there are a number of other mitigation measures that are important to be taken … the use of masks, social distance, ventilation, all these factors are important for … the reopening of schools. “
Biden promised to reopen most of the nation’s K-8 schools within his first 100 days in office, a goal he says is possible if Congress passes his pandemic rescue plan and if states prioritize teachers in delivering vaccines. But the plan has drawn criticism from critics who say Biden is shirking the teachers’ unions that helped him get elected.
The country’s two largest teacher unions have endorsed Biden for president, including the National Education Association.
Some on the left issued similar rebukes, including former New York mayor and Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg, who said on MSNBC that Biden must “face” the teachers’ unions and force the return to the classrooms.
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During an appearance on Fox News on Sunday, Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, denounced the teachers’ unions, which he claimed were “essential owners” of the Biden administration.
“This is just because of the influence, the political influence that the teachers’ union has on the Democratic Party,” said Jackson. “They are just a big bunch of supporters. And, as far as I’m concerned, they are really the worst of the worst when it comes to public unions, because of the way they manage to control Democrats.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.