It was found overseas but if it was out there, it obviously traveled. I had something similar around that time that seemed like a flu but stuck with me for about a month. Summer 2019, my mom was hospitalized for 2 weeks with a pneumonia that went crazy and she has yet to fully recover to the way she felt prior to it. It even affected her kidneys and pancreas to the point she was diabetic for 2 months before it ended.
I am fairly sure that it has been around a while longer than known, but the death totals never had a huge spike anywhere. It has definitely taken a few abnormal turns in its development but yet stayed untraceable for the most part because it doesn't affect anyone the same.
My best guess is that the bulk of the population has some level of ability to kill the virus and the exposure differences determine incubation periods-longer of which gives the body enough time to fight it off before it takes over. Those people could very well not test positive and woth antibodies deteriorating in weeks to a few months, it would be hard to catch it in the period of positive antigen testing if there is no sign of having it.
This virus has brought so many questions with so few definitive answers. I have my theories, obviously, but really cannot wait to see how it ends just from a scientific standpoint.
One new consequence form the pandemic which is now evident relating to schools. Students are missing. For all sorts of reasons and in all sorts of socio-economic areas.
@lovendures My friend is doing the Census in the inner city of Paterson, New Jersey. He was walking around at around 11:30am, and he noticed that kids were riding their bicycles outside instead of being on a Zoom meeting. In my school district, the kids have to be on Zoom until 1:30pm. They get breaks for 10 minutes, but they have to be close to the computer until 1:30pm. We will see the effects of this in 10 years.
I understand your point but disagree that we will see any difference due to the effects of covid on education. The parents that are allowing for kids to be playing instead of in school/zoom are the same parents that would be ignoring their kids' education if they were in school. The kids, en masse, won't be losing much of anything because even in normal circumstances, the ones with educationally absent parents would not retain, nor care for, anything they were taught anyway. It might, actually, have the opposite effect of what you are predicting, as the kids that don't care are removed from the situation and no longer a distraction to the teachers and the diligent students.
Basically, if you take the bad students(the ones that don't care) out of class, the teachers and students that do try, no matter their abilities, can focus on each other more and have a better chance of success.
Sadly, the world has now seen 1 million Covid deaths.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/coronavirus-deaths-1-million/
Before this is all over I saw the number, 2 million. A Great loss!
You know, I don't know of any district that does virtual learning the same way. Even differences can occur at the same school. The school my daughter teaches at had morning meetings where everyone was together, then the kids worked on there own for a few hours and then met later in the afternoon again. Now that some kids are in person and others are virtual learning it is different yet again. Some teachers are teaching both online and in person and don 't have morning meetings any longer for virtual kids. Some are only doing virtual. Some only in person. All the same school.
The district where I live teaches everything all day live online for high school kids. A neighboring hiigh school doesn't require you to be on live for lessons, but you must do the work and assignments. A local elementary school has very little class live time and mostly it is work that is assigned on Monday and is due on Friday with office online hours and video lessons that can be accesses at the students convince.
So, perhaps some of those kids are doing work, but at different times throughout the day. Or Night.
Or not at all. Or they are now homeschooled. We just don't really know do we? Wee don't even know if there are any parents at home or if they are working. It is all very odd and worrisome isn't it?
@mas1581 Mas, I think before COVID-19 I would have agreed with you on this, but I actually became one of those parents as virtual schooling went on last year -- and not because I didn't care about the twins progress in school -- it was more because the experiences they were getting from the virtual instruction was mediocre at best.
While my wife overruled my wishes and the twins are back in school now for however long that lasts, I've got several friends who decided to keep their kids at home and they have completely pushed back on the school's requirement that the kids be sitting in front of the laptop from 8:30-3:30 like it's a normal school day.
Last spring we supplemented what came home because my wife and I were both teachers, and we picked our battles -- when they'd had enough, we closed down instruction for the day. And instruction continued all summer long in this fashion. My friends are doing the same thing -- their kids get the work done, get help when they need it, and spend plenty of time being kids as the days wear on. In that down time they built massive structures out of Legos. They learned to code using some games I installed on their iPads. They explored our rural area on their bikes. They learned, just not everything the school wanted them to -- and that's totally okay!
Love and peace to you all!
My son is doing on line and is required to get outside for PE class to either ride his bike or take a walk during that period. I have seen other kids in the neighborhood out doing the same during the day. Our district offered online and in-person. Most chose in person. There is a daily Health check we have to complete. If you have to quarantine or have tested positive, you can switch to on line.
@mas1581 @lovendures @charmandernat
I have to disagree that it is overly worrisome about students taking different paths at this time. Or that there are "bad" kids. There are many kids out there who don't work well within a traditional system and the times we find ourselves in have cracked that system wide open and are bringing to the fore lots of alternative options that are just a valid and perhaps more engaging than the traditional. The article that @lovendures posted actually talks about the different options people are pursuing. Perhaps those parents who are letting their kids out to ride bikes are taking the pressure off of the kids and letting them have some enjoyment while the weather is still nice, rather than forcing them to stick with a curriculum or format that is stressful for the students, parents or both?
My girls have struggled with school, and I have posted before on all the things we have looked into as alternatives to find what will work best (considered homeschool, unschooling, etc.) We just switched our younger daughter's to where we transferred her older sister last year. It is a much better fit for them. I guess I just wanted to pipe up that this whole situation is forcing changes and adaptations to "the norm" in many areas, including and especially education. It helps to keep an open mind about how this will all play out.
I have to say that I'm incredibly disappointed in how our local district is handling this. They had all summer to figure out a good plan for distance learning, and instead, they put all their chips on in person/hybrid. A friend of mine who is on the school board said the superintendent and most of the board completely ignored parents' concerns and the governor's recommendations, and instead pushed forward as if nothing was wrong. Two weeks before the first day of school, they "voted" for hybrid instead of the in person learning they had counted on, leaving no time to plan for the families who chose distance learning ... nearly a quarter of the families in the district, including mine.
My daughter needs instruction and structure, and we had hoped teachers would post video of lectures or livestream classes ... or, at the very least, have zoom meetings a couple of times a week. But no. She is on her own, with PDFs and links to youtube videos. She swore on Sunday that she is all caught up and understands everything, but I checked online last night, and she is missing four assighnments and is at C/D/F level in three classes. She is a smart girl, but needs the motivation and structure of a classes ... and she WON'T listen to us when we tell her what she needs to do to be organized and stay up to date. It's almost at the point that I'm about to choose sending her back for second quarter and take the risk, but the numbers in the district hint that at any moment schools could be forced into distance learning ... and the teachers are NOT prepared, and it will look like March all over again (which was a nightmare).
It's entirely frustrating how little support teachers are getting, and they are told to either be all things for all students or only focus on the students who are physically in front of them, which discounts every child who is learning from home. My teacher friends are exhausted right now, from trying to figure out how to keep every ball in the air, teach half the material twice as often, AND plan for the what if scenario of distance learning that they all know if possible, even though the board is ignoring that reality.
If it's this hard for us, I can't even fathom the stress on families whose kids are learning from home while parents need to work or care for smaller children, or the students are so young that the parents needs to be very involved ... especially if the schools are not providing students with structured classwork online.