Pointing to a need to “minimize the number of times students are removed from in-person learning,” the Florida Department of Health Wednesday issued a revised rule that gives parents more authority to decide whether children go to school after being exposed to people who have COVID-19.
The emergency rule also continues to require that parents be able to opt students out of school-mask requirements but includes a change that takes aim at some school districts that only allow opt-outs for documented medical reasons.
That change says opting out of mask requirements is “at the parent or legal guardian’s sole discretion.”
Gov. Ron DeSantis doubled down Wednesday on his insistence that parents should decide whether their children wear masks at school and whether they should quarantine or attend school after being exposed to someone who has tested positive for COVID-19.
His decision is reflected in a new rule issued by his new surgeon general, Dr. Joseph Ladapo. The rule takes masking and quarantine decisions out of school officials’ hands and leaves it up to families’ “sole discretion.”
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It replaces an emergency order that had been in place since early August and faced several court challenges from school districts.
“I trust parents and families, and I don’t think they are going to go around lying,” DeSantis said at a press conference in Kissimmee.
The rule raised concerns among some medical experts who stated that the governor’s symptom-based approach was a “terrible” public health policy decision.
Thomas Hladish, a research scientist at the University of Florida’s department of biology and the Emerging Pathogens Institute, said asymptomatic people are a “major source” of COVID-19 transmission.
According to him, transmission can occur with people before they develop symptoms or with people who never develop symptoms.
“We need to err on the side of caution because when you don’t quarantine and you cause another infection that can cause a cascade of infections,” Hladish said.
The governor, however, claimed the rule is to prevent “quarantining healthy students.” He said it is “damaging for their educational advancement” and disruptive to families who are not able to work from home.
Under the new rule, if a student has been exposed to COVID-19, a parent or legal guardian can choose to keep their kids in school “without restrictions or disparate treatment, so long as the student remains asymptomatic.”
