BROOKLIN, Maine — Some Maine school districts are dealing with COVID-19 outbreaks just as they’re hitting the home stretch of another school year affected by the virus.
School Union 76 Interim Superintendent Mark Hurvitt announced Monday that The Brooklin School, which enrolls Pre-K through eighth-graders in the small peninsula town, would move to remote learning for at least the rest of the week.
Hurvitt wrote that 30 percent of Brooklin's students and staff had tested positive over the past handful of days.
"Things had been going well and we've got a real good pool testing program; we've got excellent nurses and we had things very well under control," he told NEWS CENTER Maine on Tuesday. "And then, suddenly, over the weekend, cases started to pop up."
Hurvitt is not the only school leader dealing with an outbreak.
Rumford Elementary School Principal Jill Bartash wrote a letter to families, saying 14 staff and 13 students tested positive since Thursday, adding it was the highest total since the beginning of the pandemic. She said there would be no class Tuesday.
Schools must report to the Maine Center for Disease Control when 15 percent of students and staff are absent. The Maine CDC then determines whether that is because of an outbreak. As of last Thursday, eight schools statewide confirmed outbreaks, with just over 1,000 reported cases among all schools.
Back in Brooklin, saying he's concerned for potential outbreaks in the district's other schools, Hurvitt is still focusing on a June 14 end date to the school year.
"We’re trying to get to the finish line and, up until last week, I felt we had a really good, easy path," he said. "But now, I don’t know. We’ll have to see how it goes. But, we will get to the finish line."
Leadership with the Maine Department of Education and the Maine Department of Health and Human Services were unavailable for interviews Tuesday. Robert Long, a spokesperson for the Maine CDC, sent a statement to NEWS CENTER Maine:
We’re receiving more positive test results each day, reflective of increased transmission. Wastewater screening and hospitalizations also indicate that we are in a period of increased transmission, which is consistent with what other jurisdictions saw with the Omicron subvariants. Vaccination, including boosters and second boosters for those who are eligible, remain among the most effective tools in limiting risks posed by COVID-19. We also encourage Maine people to work with their medical providers to create a plan to be able to get Paxlovid or other therapeutic treatments quickly if they test positive.