Ontario Has New COVID-19 Health Guidance For Schools & Test Results Don't Need To Be Shared
The Ministry of Health dropped the new guidelines a week before students go back to school.
A week before students are set to return to in-person learning at their classrooms, Ontario laid out some new COVID-19 ground rules for schools.
On January 10, the Ministry of Health published a seven-page document providing "basic information" to everyone in school and child care settings for certain COVID-19 health measures.
The updated document breaks down all of the do's and don'ts for PCR and rapid antigen testing, as well as contact trace management and appropriate isolation periods.
According to the government, parents won't have to report their child's PCR or rapid antigen test results to the school anymore. But, they should notify high-risk contacts.
On top of this, schools also won't be reporting students who have tested positive.
"Given the widespread transmission and inability to test all symptomatic individuals, schools will not be routinely notifying students/pupils in classes with a positive case, or if a child/staff is absent due to symptoms associated with COVID-19," read the release.
Student cohorts will also no longer be dismissed. PCR tests now will only be given to symptomatic students and staff who started feeling COVID-19 symptoms while at school.
Take-home PCR self-collection kits will, also, only be saved for "limited circumstances." This means they will no longer be given out to those feeling just one COVID-19 symptom or to "entire cohorts/school populations."
Isolation periods for those who tested positive vary between five to ten days depending on their vaccine status, age, and if they're immunocompromised.
Those who tested negative on a PCR test must stay home for 24 hours if their symptoms have been improving. Individuals will have to have two back-to-back negative results from rapid antigen testing, separated by 24 to 48 hours, and then quarantine for another 24 hours before going back to class. Isolation times from negative PCR and rapid antigen tests are upped to 48 hours if gastrointestinal symptoms are demonstrated.
Ontario's students are officially switching back to in-person learning on Monday, January 17.