you guys hold on one second we'll get
started here in a couple minutes while
everyone joins
all right
i think we are ready to start we are
live on youtube and uh ben hackman the
floor is yours excellent i am ben
hechman bexley public library director
and i am happy to co-moderate today's
lunch and learn
where we're hoping to provide some
helpful information to everybody out
there so we can make the best decisions
we can as we try to get through this
new wave of things and so with that is
my great honor to introduce my
co-moderator host
the one and only mayor ben
thank you director ben
um i am mayor ben kessler city of bexley
um
we know that omicron variant of covet 19
has been sweeping across our community
and across the country and the world
in the past week one tenth of our total
covet 19 cases have been registered here
in bexley
um as of january 12th this past
wednesday
we had 173 new cases that's the largest
new case count that we've ever logged as
a community so we know that covet 19 is
not has not gone away we know that it
continues to be
a source of concern in our communities
and our healthcare community and among
our families and so we we chose to come
back together with our ask an expert
panel we've done a few of these in the
past we're so grateful to have our
panelists here with us it's an
opportunity for us to
get a grasp on more local data and also
to hear from real people that we know
that are part of our community and that
are experts in this in these fields
about how we should be acting right now
and what we can do
um in the in the midst of a continuing
pandemic
so we're going to introduce our guests
in alphabetical order so no no privilege
or no favoritism here and i'll start by
introducing dr roger friedman dr
friedman is an allergist immunologist
specializing in treating allergies
asthma and immune deficiencies of
infants children and adults he's a bexy
resident
and he has been assisting our covet 19
task force
fastidiously since the spring of 2020.
thank you dr friedman for joining us my
pleasure
and it's my honor to introduce dr abby
norris turner who is an infectious
disease epidemiologist and professor at
the department of internal medicine at v
ohio state university and since spring
of 2020
dr norris turner's efforts uh have been
very crucial to helping us understand
the epidemiology of covenant 19 and our
local community in central ohio
happy to be here thanks
and it is my honor to introduce
cindy tyson rnbsn she's the school nurse
at montrose elementary and she's been a
central and most importantly beloved
figure in bexley city school districts
covet 19 response doctor
sorry cindy tyson is a rock star in our
community and we're so happy to have you
here cindy thank you for joining us
thank you i'm happy to be here
all right before we get started and and
director ben is about to get us kicked
off here with some questions we do have
an open q a so uh feel free to add
questions that you have as they come up
maybe you came to this with some
questions so go ahead and you can add
those to the q a um your panelists will
see them and we as hosts will and
facilitators will see them
so
we do have questions however that were
asked in advance and we have a lot of
them and so ben if you want to get us
started
wonderful dr doris turner with the cdc's
recent changes to isolation and
quarantine guidance
being announced and changed and tweet
can you speak to what the current
situation is on that front
yes i can thanks so much and
um i think the first thing i want to say
is that people were uh surprised when
the guidance changed and some people
found it confusing and it is confusing
so uh over the course of the last few
years i've had a lot of people call me
and say it just doesn't seem like it
should be that hard but when i look at
the date when something happened or when
i was told something by my
uncle who i visited with or my neighbor
and i'm trying to track backwards it
seems more confusing than it looks when
it's on the page and so just to really
um
reflect that that is true and sometimes
the dates really are confusing and it's
okay to need some help to work them out
and i can see cindy nodding because i
know she does this um with folks all the
time so
don't feel bad if this describes your
situation so um just a quick overview of
what those changes were i'm going to
start with
isolation and remind everybody that when
we talk about isolation that's for
people who have a positive
test
the guidelines for isolation are the
same whether you've been vaccinated or
not so take the vaccination information
that describes you in your household and
put it to the side
when you're talking about being positive
it doesn't matter if you've been
vaccinated in the past
um and what changed i won't talk about
the old guidelines i'm just going to
talk about the new guidelines and say
when you have a positive test
you're meant to isolate for five days
isolation means staying inside your home
and away from other people so you won't
infect them
um and so that's five days you
day zero is the day when you got your
positive test or the day when you became
symptomatic if you're if you develop
symptoms
on the sixth day after that
if you are uh asymptomatic you're
allowed to leave your house now but you
must wear a mask you can only go to
places where you can wear a mask all the
time so the cdc guidelines are quite
clear don't go to the gym don't go to a
restaurant don't go to a place where
you're not able to wear a mask and if
you're a person who can't wear a mask
for some reason don't go out at all keep
your isolation in your home for that
full 10 day period now if you have a
rapid test and you want to take a test
in that isolation period you're welcome
to take a test in that isolation period
but it doesn't matter about that masking
rule for days six through ten right so
that's the people who have a positive
test it also doesn't matter um from from
the initial test if it's a pcr test or
an antigen chest just stay home for
those five days
um the quarantine guidance is what has
led to a lot more confusion um and i'll
and again i'll go through these kind of
quickly and i can direct people to other
resources that are a little bit easier
to understand so here the your
vaccination status does matter um and
when we talk about quarantine these are
people who have not had a positive test
these are people who have had a close
contact with someone who has tested
positive right and for that guidance and
this is not
does not relate to the school setting so
this is in a non-school setting
the quarantine guidance
if you're unvaccinated or not fully
vaccinated is that you should stay in
your home for the first five days
after that if you have not developed
symptoms you can take a test
and if you and and if you feel well and
you're asymptomatic you can leave your
house then for the five days that come
after that first five days
um if you're fully vaccinated and you're
a close contact and you're asymptomatic
you don't have to stay
and that's the that's the big set of
changes
all right thank you dr turner um
we're gonna move on to roger and we've
gotten a lot of questions dr friedman
about
risk uh for those who are vaccinated
whether or not it's with the booster and
also how to view omicron
um in light of you know the omicron
variant and relative risk so we'll start
with this and they're probably gonna
have some follow-ups just to tease this
topic out a little bit more so if we're
vaccinated with the booster
can we just go ahead and get the omicron
and isolate responsibly and just be done
with it and i am quoting a question so i
don't know
and lots of people have wondered that
and people have been asking that even
from the beginning of the pandemic to
say hey if we're all going to get this
let's just get it and get it over with
that that's really a bad idea
it it it's a bad idea for a number of
reasons it's a bad idea because certain
people even vaccinated can end up being
pretty sick
furthermore we know that if you get uh
omicron uh you can spread it to lots of
people even if you've been vaccinated
you're you may be just as likely to
spread it as someone unvaccinated and
the problem is there are lots of people
who can't be vaccinated obviously
children under the age of five can't be
vaccinated that's
certainly very important and we know
that many people out there who have
immune problems and that may be either
people who have immune deficiency that i
take care of but way more people who
have cancers and are on
immunosuppressive drugs the vaccines may
not have worked as well for them so
you're putting those people at risk and
there's some evidence too that for those
people over the age of 65 and especially
over the age of 80 they may not respond
as well so again
you're being a bit socially
irresponsible if you decide hey let's
have an omicron party and just get it
and be done with it so
furthermore we know that a certain
percentage although it's smaller and if
you've been vaccinated and especially
with omicron we'll end up with this long
covet and i've got unfortunately
literally hundreds of patients who have
this and you don't want that you you you
don't want long covered short covered
you know isn't it is a problem for lots
of people if you're vaccinated way less
but long covet it's a really bad problem
i've got a lot of folks who i take care
of who are ceos of companies who are
lawyers or doctors who are who are
nurses who really aren't able to
function nearly as well as they did
beforehand and it it really affects them
so the best bet still although you know
omicron may get us all at some point if
you can avoid it and i think lots of us
can you should continue to try to avoid
it
thank you dr freeman and a quick
follow-up and this is kind of along the
same vein um is is just more practical
let's say we've all tried to avoid it
and nonetheless
covet finds us
um after having
uh cove at 19 and being fully vaccinated
do we have an extra layer of protection
should we behave any different yeah yeah
i don't think you can behave any
differently but but you do get some more
antibodies that way and and it uh is
probably
less likely you're going to get omicron
again
and the the problem we don't know about
is that we don't know what's to come
next as far as what variants gonna pop
out because i think again you know some
of us feel this is a little bit like you
know whack-a-mole we we keep
seeing new things come and almost for
sure they're gonna be new variants uh
whether those will be protected by
having had omicron we're not positive it
looks like getting omicron might protect
us a bit against delta which is
interesting if delta raises uh his or
her ugly head again
so but but the more
vaccinations you've had and and and i
want to say one important point there
the cdc hasn't yet said this but at some
point they will and it's important as
health care providers we say this to be
vaccinated it right now in 2022 means
you've had three vaccines you're not
fully vaccinated if you've just had the
original series you need three shots
whether we call it a booster or a third
shot series you really need three shots
to be protected especially against
omicron and so i think that's really
important for right now that you that
everyone goes out and gets their third
shot and again and if you get you know
if you are unlucky and a certain
percentage of people will get it um that
will give you some at least short-term
protection from getting it again we
don't know how long that's gonna last
whether it's three months or six months
and we're just not certain what's going
to happen with the new variant but you
do get a little bit of protection yes
thank you dr friedman um and uh ben i
think it's on to you yes i was gonna ask
a question okay she's back
uh so we have a question about vaccines
and young children and we're gonna
direct this to cindy uh should families
with kids who are too young to receive a
vaccine be taking additional precautions
yes most definitely um sorry about that
i am actually at work right now so i am
beside a first grade classroom so you
can imagine the
activity that's going on behind me
i have a screen behind me so you can't
see it but it's very loud um so for the
younger kids that can't get vaccinated
the best thing that our community can do
is first of all
get vaccinated
parents grandparents
um anyone that comes in contact with
these small children teachers um
any adult in our community should be
able to get should get vaccinated so
they can be able to protect these young
children
um families should mask up continue to
be masking up in public even if the
adults are are vaccinated they should be
continuing to mask out in public
themselves and their children
um and also calculate the risks of what
you're doing
um you know it's
this pandemic's been going on for a long
time so we need to always kind of um
we don't want to lock our kids up in a
room and not let them do anything um you
have to kind of like make those
decisions as a family and those
decisions aren't necessarily you know
there's not really a right or wrong um
you know way of making those decisions
you just have to do what's right for
your own family and decide to take some
risks and not take others um and then i
don't want to just disregard just being
healthy in general
making sure that everyone in your family
especially the little ones are getting
enough sleep eating right exercising
just everybody kind of taking care of
themselves and and also um doing you
know some family time and taking away
some stress as well um so those are all
important things um to be doing to
protect our little ones
excellent thank you so much
so abby
um is there any guidance out there about
having additional booster shots after
the third shot we know some countries
have already kind of gone that direction
this particular questioner had their
booster in september and is wondering
what's what's the next step
so this is one of the
kind of moving policy targets and
there's a lot of people with strong
opinions both for and against um the
timing of a fourth shot so a second
booster if you will
um and it is not being recommended for
the general public right now even for
people um over the age of 65 which is
the group that we'd likely to see it
recommended to first in the general
population there are some groups of
people immunocompromised people solid
organ transplant recipients some very
specialized groups whose individual
doctors may be recommending that for
them but it has not reached the level of
broad recommendation for any other group
um and there's a couple reasons for that
one um you know
we have the benefit of being a little
bit behind some other countries in these
surges and watching what some other
countries are doing especially countries
that have better data surveillance than
we have and
the places that have um begun the
process of thinking about a fourth shot
aren't seeing a big benefit from that
yet at a general population level
although that may change in the coming
weeks and there's also a potential
drawback if you don't have enough time
in between doses that you don't get the
same kind of boost over and above what
you got with the third boost um if you
don't wait long enough and so anyway
it's a mix of considerations and there's
no strong data saying that it must
happen on a certain timeline right now
and let me let me add one one thing to
what abby said because i agree
completely but there's certainly a
possibility in the next two three months
we may have another vaccine
that's directed specifically for omicron
and so you probably wouldn't want to get
a fourth vaccine to the same one we've
had when we're going to have a more
specialized one so i think that's
another reason to to wait unless you
have
a strong probability of problems like
immune deficiency
would be our main one
thank you all right thank you and and uh
dr friedman following up on that we just
got one through the chat here
uh that said my daughter had omicron in
december before she was eligible for her
booster is there any reason to wait to
give her the booster since she now has
the antibodies
yeah that's that's a great question um
and we we keep well say vacillating a
little bit on
on time between
getting the disease and when to give
another shot
um
most of us think that probably a wait
time of uh two to four weeks is is about
what we would recommend
um
there there's occasionally some thoughts
that hey we're making natural antibodies
and could our booster um limit that or
not get his good response and there's at
least a possibility and for a while we
at one point were waiting three months
and that turned out not to be right so
again i i think as a practical
standpoint
waiting about a month after you've had
uh
covid to get a booster if you need a
booster or to start your regular series
if you're again those are the people i'm
more concerned about too i i'd love to
have the people who got covered and
haven't been vaccinated to get there to
start their series of vaccinations
thank you um now i'm going to real
quickly answer a quick question that
showed up in the chat because i think we
can share screen and uh go through that
quickly and that was someone asked where
do we report a home test uh
home test positive if if you had an
unproctored home test so this this
applies to unproctored home tests you
would go to the franklin county public
health website you would click on the
coronavirus disease button and then
there's a button here franklin county
resident home test self-report you'd
fill out a form and there it's pretty
easy to fill out quickly and that's how
you uh that's how you report
and we will now move on to
so many great questions here
cindy
we've had a lot of questions about
contact tracing schools and how that's
happening i know there have been some
maybe some changes or obviously omicron
is presenting new challenges do you want
to just kind of generally give an update
on that
yes thank you um so
we
i wouldn't say that we have actually
given up on contact tracing we are still
working on some contact tracing to our
ability um
the surge with omicron has presented um
a little bit of a special situation
where
um you know we are
school employees that have our school
jobs that we're trying to do as well
um and
this huge surge in cases um
kind of we had to face uh the facts that
we just couldn't keep up with all of it
and in a emergency situation like at
least i feel like that's what we're
facing right now a critical situation
we are really going to have to rely on
our um community members to help us with
that
um and that's why i feel like we've
given really good direction and our
immune or in our
communications and our emails on what to
do if you have covid what to do when you
are exposed to covid
um and
we're just gonna have to count on our
community to help us make some of those
contacts
now
uh
also just to remember in this most of
the schools in most of the bexley city
schools we have all of our mitigation in
place we have spacing we have masks we
have
special cleaning protocols we have um
all kinds of different things we have
people staying home when they're sick
staff staying home when they're sick
sending kids home when they're sick so
we have all these different mitigation
pieces that make it um so that generally
in most of the buildings we don't have a
lot of true
exposures in the building
so
um that's why it's really important that
the community take on those exposures
that they've had in their personal life
and take responsibility for some of that
um so when their kids have been at a
party or um they've went to a
family member's birthday party that they
themselves try to track down those
people let them know what's happening so
we had to step away from some of those
uh that larger arena of contact trick
scene
thank you
thank you for that um all right so this
next question i think maybe for roger
maybe abby uh who came through the chat
do lingering symptoms specifically a
cough and a sore throat mean that you're
still contagious even after the five to
seven day period
abby you want to take that
yes so
the first answer is in any individual
case
there's just too much variability in the
range of symptoms that people exhibit
and how that correlates with their viral
load which is what is related to whether
they're going to infect other people so
just for transparency i wish i could say
100 anything one way or the other
but in general when you feel poorly it's
because you're still responding to
something that is still causing some
consequence in your body and that is
likely because you have virus in your
body right that and you're having an
immune response to that and so to be
careful i would say that a lingering
cough
is something that you would want to try
to control as much as possible and
consider that that person is potentially
infectious now this um gives me an
opportunity to mention something else
that's kind of in our you know kind of
disease control
um
you know tool kit now that we didn't
have a long time ago which is the use of
rapid tests and i know i've spent a lot
of time talking to people
about confusion around when and how to
use rapid tests and confusing results we
get from them sometimes and this may be
the scenario that this person is talking
about
but in general
um if you test positive on a rapid test
you are likely to be infectious
um and in general if you test negative
on a rapid test even if you have a
lingering infection you are unlikely to
be infectious
so that's not 100
rule but it's something to take account
of based on the timeline of the
infection how you feel and what you're
going about and doing in your life um as
a way to make a decision rule about that
the one rule the only rule sorry the
only symptom that cdc has made a special
carve out to say don't worry about the
lingering of this symptom is the loss of
taste and smell because that can take
weeks or months to return they said you
don't have to wait until that gets
better to consider yourself resolved but
they haven't said the same about other
about other symptoms
thank you so much dr abby okay so we
have had i'm trying to figure out how to
best structure this question
next
we've had a lot we're having a lot of
masking questions come up um
and i this is probably one that maybe
can sort of be cooperatively answered so
we're not gonna throw it to any one
person but i'm gonna we're gonna do like
a lightning round of masking questions
but before we do that and and sorry to
throw it back to you abby
abby could you kind of give us an a
general update on where we are right now
on masking and masking recommendations
some of us are hearing about
can 95 95 some 94s out there
cloth masks surgical masks it's it can
be confusing what what where are we with
guidance and then we'll have some
follow-ups
okay so there's a continuum of masks a
continuum of quality of math and earlier
in the pandemic
a mask was the thing we talked about and
now at this stage where we're at this
highly highly highly infectious variant
we're encouraging everybody to up their
masking game this isn't the first time
we've made this request we we said
similar things during delta and even
before like please please make it better
and now we're you know kind of saying it
again so the tip tip tip top of the mask
um pyramid is called an n95 sometimes
it's called a respirator
that's the kind that medical personnel
wear roger's holding one up ben's
holding one up
general population people we do not need
n95 if you have one and it's comfortable
and you want to wear it you can but it's
not needed in most settings and i find
them quite uncomfortable but the benefit
of that n95 is stuff doesn't get out and
also stuff doesn't get in
the next step uh kind of down the
cascade and i'll stop after this and
turn it over to others um it's called a
kn 95 and it's essentially you can think
of it as the general population version
of the n95 and thank you for the visuals
um and you can buy they usually cost
about a dollar each you can buy them you
know in in regular type of places you
don't need to get them from a medical
distributor you've probably seen some
stories that there's a lot of
counterfeits out there of both of these
kinds of masks and um kind of following
along the discovery of counterfeits
there's now a lot of articles about how
to pick a good can 95 and try not to get
um get a fake so it just to talk about
my own personal family situation we've
now switched to wearing those kn95s and
all the places where we used to wear you
know a paper surgical mask or a cloth
mask just because they do like i said a
minute ago a much better job both
keeping us from infecting other people
and from other people infecting us it's
a two-way kind of protection that that
the old kind of cloth mask we used to
wear just doesn't spring
but i'm happy to pass it to my
colleagues to talk about other kinds of
masks
i just think for kids in general it's
important that they're wearing a
well-fitted mask
and something that they can commit to
wearing all day long
um and it has to fit
good enough that we're not like letting
any breath or air out through the sides
um but it has to be something that the
kid can commit to wearing all day at
school and out in the public and not
complain about so if it's something
uncomfortable
i guarantee you they're taking it down
when they shouldn't be so
just making sure that that's well
fitting and comfortable for the kids
and cindy just as a follow-up sorry
roger real quick follow-up to that one
of the questions we had in the chat was
um
if we should be buying n95 masks for our
kids
uh this this person has a kindergartener
who already complains about wearing
school provided cloth masks so they
worry about
using both improperly of trying to force
something else i can i can tell you from
my experience the k 95s that we offer at
city hall you can come and get one for
yourself
don't
do not fit my kids smaller faces as well
so any thoughts on that
yeah i mean they do have this i mean
they do have children size kn 95 masks
and some children find them pretty
comfortable
um but again
i'm going to stress the importance i
would love to see all of our kids here
in the school wearing kn95s
um
if they could not wear that we did
distribute the
bexley city schools gave out the um
three layered fabric masks with the
filters in them those are those are
really good we still have some of those
left
um and then
also just again just saying that
um it just needs to be something that
your child can wear all day so that's
really the biggest thing to me right now
is just making sure they're keeping them
on their faces and they're able to wear
them all day
thank you and roger look you had a
follow-up no yeah
i was just going to emphasize i mean
that obviously the best mask you could
wear for general public
uh i think for most people would be a
kn95 and i think that's important
especially depending where you're going
to be
you know if you're going into you know
the grocery store for one minute and
you're not gonna be around many people
then you know your surgical cloth mask
was probably gonna be fine most of the
time if you're gonna be going to a
betsley basketball game or you're going
to a
ohio state game or a hockey game where
they're
literally thousands of people i would
personally suggest not doing that right
now temporarily but if you're going to
do that you want to use a really good
quality mask and you want to use for
sure can 95
i think the reason the cdc didn't
make stronger recommendations is that
they were just thinking of the
practicalness that people if they have
uncomfortable fitting masks they're not
going to wear them at all and so again
we're much better wearing some masks
than no masks go put that way but at
least uh at least the surgical masks in
the can 95 again i think most adults
find comfortable and there are ones for
kids so the families that want their
kids to be a bit a bit more protected if
the kids will wear it i think the can 95
for kids is a good is a good option
i just i wanted to add one thing i meant
to say earlier so
the changes in the quarantine and
isolation guidance from cdc
really relies on wearing if you've had a
positive test and you want to get out of
isolation on day six it really relies on
you wearing a high quality mask you are
potentially still infectious walking in
the world and if you're wearing a bad
mask you're much more of a threat to the
people around you so we should all be
wearing higher quality masks but
especially at the end of that isolation
period so all of us who have been able
to get kn95s if you have a neighbor that
can't get them and is in that position
if you can share them or if you can
speak to city hall and see if they have
some that can be given maybe the school
has some that can be given in that
circumstance really get good quality
masks into people in that slice of time
that period of time is really benefic to
the community
so don't show one you've already worn
we'll make sure it's a new a new mask
and there you go right well so i think
we had a follow-up question so once we
get a good high-quality kn95 mask how
many times can we wear it uh is a
question that we got can you wear it
more than one time one day
can you clean it in a paper bag
and if i get one with copper does that
help in any extra okay
yeah that question was assigned to me
yeah getting copper is not a good idea
washing it doesn't work
but what most of us in healthcare have
been doing is having our paper bag and
wearing it for a day and then putting
the paper bag and putting it away for a
week and it doesn't it isn't so much the
paper bag cleans it but the virus if
there is some there dies and we're not
keeping them all over the place and and
so yes you can re-wear them you can wear
them for for a fair amount of time um we
think you know just so everyone knows
back in the day before um
coronavirus we were one mask
for one room
we would wear a mask if you were in the
hospital you would your where your mask
and you would dispose of it when it came
out but because of tremendous shortages
we we stopped doing that and
again we we found you can wear them
longer we can't the kn 95s the i mean
the the n95s our best surgical map again
there are there are companies again here
in town that clean these for us but
professionally and they can do it until
they kind of die but for most of you if
you wear it for a day
you put in a bag and wear another one
the next day that's that's a practical
answer i think for most people
thank you um
so i'm trying to make sure that everyone
everyone's having a chance here to talk
and we're answering questions that we're
getting and thank you so much for the
great questions that have been coming in
cindy um
got
come in a little bit back to the
contacts and how parents should sort of
assess risk
one of the questions is is
i'm gonna kind of summarize it but
basically if my
my child had a close contact at the
school and i haven't heard from anyone
at the district who should i reach out
to what should i do
well
um i guess that would kind of depend on
how they know that they are a close
contact um do they just suspect that
their child is a close contact did they
just get an email from the school saying
that there was a case in the room i mean
there's all these little nuances to
the true exposures and closed contacts
um if they suspect that their child um
so the question was if they if they
suspect that their child was exposed to
a close contact
what should they do i think i think it's
just generally if they if you haven't
heard something but you you have some
concerns
uh that your child might have had a
close contact or been exposed to someone
who's a close contact either would apply
what would what would what would a good
step for a parent be to take at that
point well at this point if they're
comfortable they could also just reach
out to that close contact and if they
have the ability to reach out to that
close contact
um their parent or the person themselves
and actually just ask about it and kind
of figure it out between each other like
whether or not that was a true contact
if they're not comfortable doing that or
they don't have the the way to contact
that person
um then they should call us the school
nurses or the athletic trainers um and
let us know and we'll try to investigate
a little bit to see if there should be
any concern
yeah and i guess i think that was maybe
i don't know that that's the right
answer but
what you said you know reaching out
reaching out to the the schools talking
to you as a nurse
um you know you guys are such a great
resource and i know that i have used
that in the past as a parent when i've
had a question giving you a call and
saying hey i might have this concern
what's what is your guidance and you
guys have been such a great resource so
um
also thank you for that
yes yeah we're always available to
answer the questions and try to help you
work through it um sometimes we don't
know all the answers to the questions
and if we don't we'll figure it out for
you
thank you
on to you ben
excellent uh dr norris turner i think
that this question came through as a
follow-up on your earlier early earlier
summary so if you are vast and boosted
and we're exposed to someone who is
positive and you are symptomatic what
steps do you follow i think you only
talked about this if you were
asymptomatic
yes thank you for the follow-up i think
i was so focused on being quick that i
left this category out so i'm grateful
to get to talk about it again
um so if you are symptomatic in this
moment you have something that looks
like covet and acts like covid at this
moment given how much covet is around us
you should act as though you probably
have copied um it's very hard to get
tested right now and sometimes people
will who are symptomatic will get you
know do a rapid test and it will be
negative and they do another it's
negative and yet they feel poorly and
they were exposed
you can go and get a pcr test but
generally at that point you should
assume that you probably have covid and
start an isolation period and i know
that's sometimes not an answer people
want to hear um but if you just want to
know from the population level you know
disease transmission perspective it's
quite likely that you do have covet and
you're you can start your isolation
period from the time that you became
symptomatic the way it's working right
now sometimes people get their pcr tests
back when they would have been getting
out of isolation anyway
um
this a little bit relates to the
question that cindy answered a minute
ago about um so a person who is a close
contact to a case um and and what should
you do in that scenario and i guess i
just wanted to to add that what the
school is doing
is informing families when there's a
when there's a contact at school and so
it sounded like from from the question
that is what the parent is worried about
but all of us should be aware of what to
do with any kind of a close contact in
or outside of school right and and in
that scenario you follow one path if
you're fully vaccinated which is like
you pay attention to whether you get
symptoms
i wouldn't plan any travel you know you
want to be careful when you go different
places we should all be wearing a mask
anyway um and if you're unvaccinated
then that's when you're meant to stay
home for five days and definitely stay
away from immunocompromised people and
wear masks when you when you when you
are done with your five-day period so i
think all of us should kind of
as many of us do operate with this index
of suspicion that if you feel bad and
you have a potential contact at this
point like it's probably what it is so
yeah from the school's point of view
you're never going to
um if there's a if there's been a close
contact in the school and we're aware of
it you will generally hear from one of
us personally whether that is a phone
call an email and they will actually
spell it out for you that you're a close
contact
um
so i don't know if that helps as well
but let me add one one other thing a
little different vein that may come up
but
that with omicron we're seeing so many
different symptoms and and
three three quick ones one is that
many patients we're seeing all they're
having is a sore throat and a little
runny nose and again cindy sees that you
know
every day every kid has that every one
of my allergic kids have that every i
mean it it you know we're basically
anyone calls us and said hey i'm having
to get we need to get tested first and
and we you need to be tested and second
of all um we're seeing some of the
younger kids
a lot of crew and that's that's new and
different with omicron that kids are and
adults too presenting upper airway crew
type type problems and so again we're
being very suspicious and testing all of
those kids and the last that's been very
different
we're seeing very little losses sense of
taste and smell in omicron i mean that
was almost patho mnemonic for delta and
alpha beta
gimel dama
all our other uh
covid's but
with omicron loss of sensation as well
has been way less common in fact my my
guess is almost everybody i've seen
who's lost their sensition smell even
recently in the last couple weeks have
probably been the remnants of delta and
not been omicron so just some little
parental tidbits out there for all of us
not i'm not sure it makes us more
comfortable or less comfortable but just
more aware
thanks roger to piggyback a little bit
off of that
and just the difference in different
variances and i think with the surge
that is currently
occurring in our community
is there any way that we should be
acting differently when we're in the
midst of a surge as opposed to
um
you know when it's not quite as intense
so in the past
as conditions have changed how should we
behaving differently than we might have
behaved beforehand yeah it and and
you're going to get at least roger
friedman's opinion right now so that's
uh that's what we're looking for
i i'll carry out that you know uh
six weeks ago
eight weeks ago i was going to ohio
state basketball games and hockey games
knowing that i was wearing a mask and
even though only half the people were
wearing masks i felt comfortable because
i was wearing a mask
uh
but now
um i won't go to a basketball game i
won't go to a hockey game i won't go to
a place where not ever
even if they're masked i think right now
it's just so darn contagious i think you
know
going to restaurants i think
is dangerous right now in my opinion
where people aren't you again you go to
a restaurant you take off your mask to
eat i i think that's i think when we're
in the midst of this horrible surge
those are things that are less safe to
do
um even travel you know uh a month ago
you i felt more comfortable going on an
airplane i'm probably a little less
comfortable today
hopefully a month from now three weeks
from now four weeks from now we'll be
back to where we were and uh me
personally i i'd recommend and be feel
more comfortable doing those things
thank you
can i add to that
please add to that yes
also i want to say that um
another way that you can um help this
whole situation in this surge is also
keeping your
keeping yourself at home when you're
feeling sick keeping your children home
when they're feeling sick and i've had
so many
families and i totally understand how
confusing it is and how hard it is i
don't know
you know i without a test i don't know
if your child has coveted or dying but
if your child has any of the symptoms
any of the symptoms then they really
just need to stay home
especially during this surge and we'll
figure it out at home
um because once they come here and
they've been here all day with their
runny nose or
their sore throat and then you know we
don't find out about it until the next
day then everybody else has been you
know potentially exposed and it just
becomes a just big mess
so um you know it's it's weird but at
this time we just really have to ask you
during this critical time to just keep
those kids home you stay home when
you're sick keep your kids home when
they're sick and when they're feeling
much better and they can wear their mask
all day and they can do their work
or if they've tested and they've tested
negative
then bring them on into school
another thing about this is that the um
i'm finding with our rapid tests right
now
um
i am not we are not being able to pick
up the uh the coronavirus as easily
um or on the first test like we did
um maybe with delta or the other
variants i feel like i'm testing kids
like two maybe three times before i get
a positive
let me i'm gonna amplify because i i
think we're finding that cindy
everywhere i think what cindy's telling
you
s has been accurate on the ground that
it's not till day two or three sometimes
that we're seeing positive tests and and
it's a good point to make and abby will
probably amplify on it better but people
have been suggesting that you should
then you know use your rapid testing as
a throat swab instead of a nasal swab
and
from children's hospitals infectious
disease experts and others around the
country we'd suggest not doing that
because you're you're that's not the way
it was meant to be used and it may give
you lots of false
answers and so i again i i know it's
tempting but those swabs weren't meant
to be that way and most people can't do
a very good throat swab and get in the
right place who's not a medical person
so again i'd
i'd stick with using the nose swab
knowing that it may take a day or two to
be positive i i think that's the real
message cindy's given that's accurate
and if you get a positive trust the
positive the the scenario we're talking
about is getting a negative when you're
symptomatic and that doesn't seem right
that's probably right it's not right um
you're probably correct in your
intuition that that's not right but if
it's positive you can trust the positive
i i wanted to just to go back to your
question mayor ben about what should we
be doing different
um and there's two things that people
stop doing you know kind of way in the
beginning um that i want to i want to
advocate that we not do okay so one of
them is we cancelled all of our
preventive care we stopped going to the
dentist stopped going doctor we you know
and that is not the scenario where we
are right now people should be getting
preventive care the medical
medical systems know how to handle
caring for people who don't have covid
um and they'll let you know if they
can't handle it they'll let you know if
you need to reschedule something because
of this current surge but can i would i
feel safe going into places um that
their protocols are going to be safe um
for me in that situation and the other
thing is
we all became very much very socially
isolated and there's a lot of mental
health consequences to that a lot of
anxiety and a lot of sadness um and a
lot of things that have been missed over
the last two years and we also know a
lot more now how to have social
engagement that can feel safe is safe so
do it outside open the window things
that we've talked about on these panels
many times before but
but as an epidemiologist i do not
advocate for for shutting down and
shutting out all of those things that's
not where we are right now we do need to
find ways to be together in a safe and
healthy way
thank you
that's a really solid segue into
i just even some of this conversation
can cause anxiety i think everyone is on
the call today is probably trying to do
the right thing and it's complex and
it's difficult and so that is anxiety
inducing on top of everything else
so
i think especially as we're talking
about the kids mental health with the
isolation and quarantining and those
things but of course this is not just
impacting kids it's also impacting all
of us
is there any
suggestions you have and just dealing
with some of that and and maybe what
mindset we can kind of have
um at this current stage as we're
dealing with the the new ramifications
of the current surge and stuff in the
pandemic that's a i guess an open
question to everyone
i can answer that
sorry go ahead abby
okay i can say that um it's been it's
been not so great with you know the kids
um i mean they're not suffering in any
way but they're i mean there's been a
lot of changes i have second graders
here who have never had a normal year of
school
they've never
i can't recognize them
i don't know their names
and that probably does have an impact on
kids
they can't see my emotions i can't see
their emotions are we communicating
properly like there's all kinds of
things that are involved in that
um
so yes i think it does have a great
impact on the kids i think um
but i think they're going to be okay i
think that they're you know we're going
to get through this and we're going to
revert back to semi-normal and they're
going to be okay but there are
you know so many things that you can do
at home to kind of help relieve your um
your stress and your children's stress
and you know i think the important thing
is to talk to your kids about
they're all talking about kobe they talk
about kobet all day long here at school
how it is who has coveted using in the
covered room like there's i mean you
know my mom has it's kind of like a
competition now like you know well my
mom had covered twice and you know
you've only had covet once so i mean
it's just normal talk now in school but
i think the biggest thing is to make
sure that your kids know that especially
especially if they're back that they're
able to be vaccinated that they are you
know just probably going to have a mild
illness like a cold and they're going to
be okay
and that you took all these precautions
by getting them vaccinated and we wore a
mask so that we would get through
whatever happens easily and
i think that kind of helps relieve the
fears of the children i know when i have
to tell them something here at school
the first thing i always tell them is
you know
i usually don't have to tell them
they're positive they're usually testing
at home for their positive but if
they're an exposure i make sure to tell
them you are first of all you are not
sick and you do not have copay so you
are okay and now this is what we're
going to do and so i think those are
just like the important things for kids
to keep in in a perspective
and i think that's a that's such a great
point cindy i think that um you know
i've just as
with my own kids i've seen evidence of
just a heightened anxiety around kovid
that
um because we are so focused on it
because it's a word that gets used all
the time and it's important that we be
focused on it that sometimes that can be
driven to almost
mythical proportions in the minds of our
children and just remembering how to
contextualize that risk for them and
reassure them throughout this i think is
really important um we we have a cup we
have a couple questions that i want to
make sure that we get through everything
as quick as
everything before the end of our uh
before the end of our time here so i'm
gonna have a couple lightning round
questions so i'm gonna throw these out
and you need to give answers in 10
seconds that's your challenge so here's
here's one what if i'm like going to the
dentist for regular cleaning which
remove means removing
my mask
for them to work what's the risk i
believe i think the question's getting
at what's the risk to either me or the
uh or the dentist in that instance way
greater way greater greater risk for the
dentist the dentist is well protected
he's wearing again he or she is going to
be protecting you by wearing the
appropriate uh high quality mask and so
i think you have very little risk going
to the dentist you may put him in a tiny
bit of risk him or her and a tiny bit of
risk but they're taking the right
precautions too so i think that's a safe
important thing to do if you need it
thank you dr roger now if someone in my
house is positive and they're isolating
from the outside world do they need to
isolate from everyone in the house
so you've got a positive do they need to
isolate the house i mean the answer is
if they don't isolate from everyone in
the house everyone in the house is
likely to test positive so
if you want to i mean sometimes this is
impossible to have a two-year-old with
covid they can't be kept from everyone
in the house right but the expectation
would be if the positive person is not
staying separate but others in the house
will become covet positive and you'll be
on a kind of isolation
kind of extended cycle
thank you dr abby okay another quick one
what special caution should those over
65 take that do not necessarily apply to
younger people
yeah thanks i'll take that since i'm the
only one over 65 in the group here um
yeah you know early on in the pandemic
we had greater clearly had greater risk
age was one of the main main risks but
also it has to do with a lot of
pre-existing conditions
more so probably than age and uh the the
good news is most people over 65 have
been vaccinated most over 65 have been
triple maxed and so i think
again we want to take uh appropriate
cautions like anybody else but i think
for those of us who don't have any other
pre-existing conditions like diabetes
like heart disease like obesity uh i
think we probably have
no no much greater risk and we've been
more likely better protected
thank you on to you ben
okay so uh with all of that
how can we best support bexley city
school students and staff considering
that data shows a lot of transmission
that is not directly related to being in
the classroom like that's for cindy
i think i already kind of touched on
this and that was just really making
sure we're taking care of um the bit our
business at home like making sure we're
getting back sorry
sorry
work hazards um making sure we're
getting vaccinated
making sure we're masking up in public
again staying well reporting close
contact staying home when sick
testing
those are really the best ways that you
can support the school community to keep
things running and to keep things going
i'm just going to add one thing to that
which is to be nice to them the people
yes thank you
yeah
people are working so so hard and it's
confusing for everyone and frustrating
for everyone and they want more than
anyone else in the whole town for
everybody to be able to be in school
safely and well
it's true and we're all learning i mean
we didn't like sign up for this so we uh
we are all learning with you so when you
learn the new information we are
learning it too so then we have to take
that and decipher it and what it means
to the schools um or to the city or
whatever and or to the library and um so
those you know that just takes some time
it takes us time to look at it and
research it and um we're just i mean
most of us that are doing this some of
us that are doing this have no better
medical background whatsoever
and they're like rock stars and contact
racing and um you know running a school
with uh you know the uh with covid and
all that comes with it so yes being
being uh pleasant and realizing that
we're all in a very um uncomfortable
situation sometimes and confusing and
just to be kind to each other
that's such an important point and i
think one one thing that
you know we've all been able to see uh
from our school district's response
throughout this this ongoing pandemic is
the thoughtfulness and the careful
deliberation as you guys have just
pivoted
um month after month change after change
and that is so appreciated and thank you
for your your time your
tirelessness i guess um speaking of
tirelessness we are fatigued we're all
fatigued we're all so sick in fact i
said something today my staff i said i'm
i'm done saying the word covet it's
never we're not saying that again
as wishful thinking but um you know
we all all of us i think uh in our
respective worlds get get correspondence
that you know we need to stop thinking
about this move on just return to normal
roger you're at the front line of as a
medical professional abby as an
epidemiologist cindy as a
supporter of education what do you have
to say to people who say you know what
this is overreaction it's time to just
move on where are we today and why is
that not true or not true
so um i i talk about
first taking a moment of silence for the
850 000 americans who have died from
coven so this is not an overreaction
talk about the 20 000 ohioans are
getting it every day
and the fact that our hospitals are
overwhelmed with people
and our icu's with covet so this is a
real pandemic and it's a
real life and death situation that we um
can do a better job on and we are trying
to do a better job and i think we're
lucky in bexley where we've done a great
job of of mandating and having masks and
trying to do protective things um
we all understand covert fatigue whether
it's um for some of us in the healthcare
profession for the first time ever
losing some empathy for people who are
bringing some disease upon themselves i
think that's something we we're all
trying to fight because uh we want to
treat everyone well and helpfully and do
a good job i'm going to be hope helpful
and hopeful though the the the hope is
all pandemics then that that we know in
history all pandemics end and this one
will end too and i fervently believe
that omicron
we hope and i'm going to be hopeful is
going to be our last major wave of this
and that in four or six weeks we're
going to get back to where we were
hopefully back in last may and june
where we saw a light at the end of the
tunnel and i think we're going to be
there again and i think we're going to
be able to you know those of us who've
been vaccinated will not need to wear
masks and i think we'll be safe to go to
restaurants and safe to go to ball games
and safe to do all the things we want to
do knowing that we may still have some
covet around and some people will get it
but it isn't going to overwhelm our
right now if you go to mount carmel's
anywhere mount carmel it looks like a
war zone it looks like vietnam we have
we have uh
soldiers there helping to take care of
people because our health care
professionals many of them have been
heroes to this are out sick with this
with omicron right now and they're
they're out again not being able to work
and again the ers and the hospitals have
been overwhelmed children's hospital
which
we're not overwhelmed with it at
children's hospital but the numbers are
dramatically increased they're two three
four times what we were seeing and
there's still a lot lots of sick kids
there so again we want to keep our kids
safe especially those who can't be
vaccinated um keep our are people who
who are underlying conditions safe and
keep our people who haven't been
vaccinated safe too i want i want them
to be safe also i want because i don't
want to give this to them because
they're more likely to get sicker from
it so again that's my thoughts
and and roger you kind of your question
there is is is leading into the last
question that we have so i'm going to
open this up maybe to cindy and dr
norris turner
uh crystal ball what do you think the
next six months is gonna look like and
what can we maybe be looking forward to
or should be prepared to deal with
um like roger
i hope roger's vision and for the next
six months is is close to what happens
uh but we want to just say from your
guys's point of view what do you think
uh the the future looks like
well i can speak to just just the way
the school is and i i mean i think i
don't see any major changes happening in
our in our school district i think we'll
continue on with our mitigation and
we'll continue on doing some things that
we've been doing because they've been
working well um we've been doing a great
job bexley continues to be
one of the best one of the lowest um
coveted case counts
of all the schools in franklin county so
what we're doing is working
and i'm going to see that that's
probably going to continue through
at least the rest of the school year now
dr turner will have to talk to
what the pandemic itself will look like
yeah i think the omicron
wave will
is cresting currently depending on where
you are geographically in the u.s and is
going to be on the downward slope um by
the end of january maybe even by the
third week of january depending on where
you are um and then then we'll see how
quickly it goes down looking at some
other places that have gone before us it
could go very fast but it could also be
a little bit of a slower path and i
think people are still optimistic that
by the late spring we'll be in an
endemic phase instead of an epidemic
phase which means
cova-19 becomes a seasonal respiratory
virus that hurts some people get very
sick from it and the rest of us think of
it to get a shot for it wonder if we
have it when we get sick in the winter
but we don't build our whole lives
around it that's my hope for
later in 2022.
that's that's really wonderful and i
think with that positive note i want to
say thank you to the panelists
uh and for the folks who've tuned in
today
it's just really tremendous and says so
much about our community that you guys
are willing to come and help everybody
else in the community with this
and so it'll be recorded if you want to
watch this later i also want to give a
shout out to the co-moderator uh this is
i'm happy to be a part of this because i
think it's really helpful to what we do
so
with that i'm going to turn it back over
to mr mayor thank you director ben um
i do i do have one last lightning round
question for dr abby dr abby favorite
library director go
all right yes thank you he is he is very
yeah i thought so um so this this uh
this i i i i had a
you know we've had this q a coming in
we've had some chat i've been getting
some texts as we've been sitting here
and a tweet came across
uh this this is a solid generation x dad
joke i have to warn you in advance but
the cdc recommends you wake in the
morning and you step outside and you
take a deep breath and you get real high
and you scream at the top of your lungs
what's going on
and uh i i don't want to end it on such
a trivial note
but i do think it's funny to it's good
to keep some humor through uh even
stressful times and um
i do want to say the
the help that you guys have all been
throughout this is really stellar um
abby
and roger you've been on the city's task
force since early 2020 cindy you've been
at the front lines of the schools
tirelessly and passionately advocating
with
all of us i think with the doses of good
humor and seriousness in turn and i
think if the community truly saw all the
work and time and effort and energy
that's gone into it i know that they
would be so appreciative i know that
they are so appreciative i think they
would be in awe of of really the type
the type the tenor the quantity of
assistance that you guys have all given
so our our thanks to you guys is
boundless
um thank you for sticking with us you
have kept our community safe i mean
we've watched through this how the
guidelines that you've helped us craft
and the
practices that you've helped us carry
out whether in our school district or
businesses or communities have really
made such a great difference to our
residents i believe firmly that
they have saved lives i believe that
they have saved long covered
instances down the road and um so thank
you so much for that and i know that you
will continue to help us and we'll
continue to be working hard and
diligently so thank you to all of you
who participated today thank you for
those who asked questions you guys asked
great questions it was our pleasure to
help get them answered um hopefully we
don't need another one of these but i
think you might have said that last time
so if we do
yeah if we do we'll be here and let's
hope we don't and everybody stay safe
and have a great