new york city mayor bill de blasio says
the science
is what led them to close the schools
again shocking parents
across new york but does the science
really say
about cover 19 infections in children
according to the new york times here's
what it says about
out of 16 348 staff members and students
tested randomly by the school system in
the first week of the testing regimen
the city's gotten back results for 16
298.
there were only 28 positives 20 staff
members
and eight students and according to the
city's own data the positivity rate in
the schools is around
two percent one headline today raised
the question if new york city schools
is closing its schools but not its
restaurants or its gyms
should parents drop their kids off at a
bar joining me now randy weingarten
president of the american federation of
teachers representing 1.7 million
educators and school staffs
uh school staff across the country randy
thank you very much for coming back
tonight i know this is obviously a very
uh sensitive issue and i think one of
the reasons is is that we've heard
to follow the science to listen to the
scientists there's been
a very strong study out of brown
university also another study by the
atlantic
which says that essentially the
infection rate is point
is 0.13 among the students and .24
among the staff the cdc has recommended
that kids stay in school
and what we've seen happen in europe and
in the uk is that what has worked
is to keep schools open so why
the decision to close the schools in new
york at this 3 percent level
so um by the way the cdc has actually
just
taken that recommendation you just had
off
their website and let's see what what
where the cdc
that was today redfield said that today
let's play that that was today let's
play it
yeah k through 12 schools
can operate with face-to-face
learning and they can do it safely
and they can do it responsibly the
infections that we've identified in
schools
when they've been evaluated were not
acquired in schools the truth is for
kids k
through 12 one of the safest place they
can be
from our perspective is to remain in
school
that was earlier today randy yeah no no
what i'm saying but but look i think
that dr redfield is right and i think
you'd be surprised
that um i agree with you i think that we
need to be focused on what's going on in
terms of the communities and like in
europe
we should be closing bars and
restaurants
and doing a coveted stimulus to make
sure they stay in business
and trying to keep schools open what
we've learned
and and frankly the new york city
experience is really important
what we've learned is that when you
actually do
the testing and when you have the
safeguards that new york city put in
place and i remember you and i
kind of rift about this you know when it
was first started and i kept pushing for
those safeguards
but when you put them in place you see
that schools
are not super spreading events and
that's really really good
the problem is that schools are not
impervious to all that is going on
in the outside and what the mayor saw
today or the last couple of days
is that in staten island and other
regions in the city you were seeing
you were seeing a trajectory that was
going way up
and so what mike mulgrew and the uft and
others are saying to the city
begging the city wear your mass get the
infection rate down
because we want schools but what we're
hearing is the schools need to be open
is the point the kids need to be in the
schools because what's been decided by
the cdc
it's the it's i mean it sounds like the
union doesn't want the teachers in the
classroom and the
mayor doesn't want the teachers in the
classroom the parents clearly want the
teachers in the classroom and the cdc
wants
them in the classroom you're you're
actually not listening to me
what has happened here is that new york
city
was the only school major school
district in the nation
to actually reopen schools but they're
closing now randy
and they're why are they closing now
martha they're closing now because what
the city said
and frankly what lots of other places
um are are also seeing is a huge
skyrocketing increase okay now you're
right you're not
because the science says yes everyone
agrees we see a spike we're in a second
wave
you and i totally agree on that what
they are not what they're telling us
though is that the wisest
scientific move is to have children in
school
because what we're seeing is a
tremendous loss of learning we're seeing
kids who are emotionally unstable
because they're not in the classroom
because they're not seeing their friends
and we know from the studies this isn't
me saying this this is
brown university and other studies that
the the transmission rate is
very very low it's a great news story
it's a great news story what happened
when you open the school it is the kids
made out very very well that's wonderful
news they should stay there
i i agree i agree with you i
you know and what the uft is trying to
do
is that they're trying to figure out a
regional
um a regional way of opening and closing
like they did
after they don't need to close that's
the point they don't need to close is
the point
martha there's a there is a number
i know mr dr redfield um didn't opine
directly on new york city
and i'm telling you that they took off
the biggest story
days ago that schools that schools
um i was surprised that they took that
off the website
about i don't know why they took it off
the website but you just heard it from
the director's mouth and he said that
today
i know i was glad and no doubt he said
it in reaction to what happened in new
york because that's been the huge focus
uh lately but but the teachers union and
the you guys
set the three percent threshold right
that when you hit that
it says a measurement established by the
teachers union over the summer
in order to reach an agreement to reopen
in the first place was a 3
threshold that was that was actually not
true
the mayor set the 3 threshold what the
teachers union did in new york city
afterwards
was to say these are the safeguards that
we need and this is the testing we need
and the good news story here which you
and i agree on
is that when you have that testing and
when you have those safeguards
we saw that in new york city exactly
the schools were basically safe the
issue now is
how to make sure the rest of this that
the issue in new york city
was the rate of increase that was
happening from
point five to about three percent i i
hear you but the point is that even
and give us what we have even given that
all of these
experts and scientists say the children
are safer in school
it's worked across europe it's worked
across the uk they never closed their
schools during their second spike
and now they're in recovery they're down
10 percent and the kids are not missing
out
and what they did and what and what they
did
in europe and what they did in new
zealand is
that they had national leadership
that closed that that did mass
that actually closed the bars that did
some of those things including the
stimulus yeah given all that they still
say the kids are
they're connected martha the number's
rising but the kids are safer in school
those are the two realities from what
we're hearing from all these scientists
i
i agree i agree with you we've been
trying to get kids back into school
throughout the country and we worked
with new york city to do
it but we have to get community spread
down now
i got to leave it thank you randy thank
you very much randy weingarten
head of the uft teachers union