There are already 35 states that have announced the closure of schools as a preventive measure to avoid coronavirus infections:
Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Carolina del Norte, Carolina de Sur, Dakota del Norte, Dakota del Sur, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, Nuevo Mexico, Nueva York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia y Wisconsin.
At least 64,000 U.S. schools are closed, scheduled to close, or were closed and then reopened, affecting at least 32.5 million students.
In addition, also large districts such as those of Los Angeles and Miami, took this step.
The authorities of Boston They decided that, starting on March 17 and for a month, all public schools will be closed due to the coronavirus outbreak.
They are at least some 10,600 public and private establishments that will not teach classes for several weeks, affecting some 4.9 million students, according The Washington Post.
The governor of New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham, announced that all public schools will close from next Monday until next April 3.
However, this period could be extended depending on the conditions that the state faces in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, which has the highest percentage of Latino population in the country.
The school cafeterias will continue to operate to offer breakfast and lunch services to low-income students, he said.
The governor of West VirginiaJim Justice said schools will be closed “as much and as long” as necessary, while in Rhode Island classes are suspended only next week, for now.
En Louisiana, the classrooms will be closed from next Monday until April 13th to try to “minimize the spread of the disease,” Governor John Bel Edwards said.
Meanwhile, the governor of Illinois, Jay Robert Pritzker, announced that all K-12 schools (preschool through twelfth grade) in the state, whether public or private, will close their doors starting next Tuesday 17 and until March 30.
“All the options have cascading effects for citizens and vulnerable populations in terms of access to food, safety, child care and social services. We have seen what happens in places that did not act with urgency,” Pritzker said in a statement.
The two large school districts of California, that of Los Angeles and San Diego, announced similar measures last Friday, as did cities such as Houston, San Francisco y Washington, D.C, Meanwhile in Arizona eight school districts did the same.
The schools of the public educational system of Miami-Dade, those of the Catholic Archdiocese of Miami (spanning the counties of Miami-Dade, Broward y Monroe) and other educational centers will remain closed from next week, their leaders announced this Friday.
The public schools will not open from Monday onwards and the religious schools will close from Tuesday.
In Miami-Dade Spring break was scheduled to start on Monday 23 of March and will last a week.
In this way, the holidays were brought forward a week in Miami-Dade, which has the fourth largest public school district in the country, with about 350,000 students, only behind New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.
The governor of Michigan, Gretchen Withmer, announced that in that state all K-12 schools will be closed from Monday 16 and will reopen on April 6. The same will happen in New Mexico, announced the authorities of this state.
The governor of Ohio, Mike DeWine, announced the decision to order the closure of all schools in the state during three weeks.
In Maryland, schools will be closed from March 16 to 27exactly two weeks.
In Oregon, the school closings will remain in effect until March 31st, as reported by state authorities. Kentucky schools will be closed during the same time.
At washington state, schools in three counties will be closed for six weeks.
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As he Los Angeles Unified School District like San Diego They also announced this Friday that they will close all the centers under their supervision as of Monday as a preventive measure against the coronavirus.
The measure will affect 900 installations serving more than 670,000 students in Los Angeles already 130,000 students in San Diego, where schools will be closed at least until April 6.
Thus, some 900,000 Southern California students will stay home for the next three weeks.
“There is evidence that the virus is already present in the communities we serve, and our efforts must now be directed at preventing its spread. We believe that closing the two largest school districts in the state will make an important contribution to this effort, “explained Los Angeles school district superintendent Austin Beutner, according to ABC television.
In his statements, Beutner argued that the staff of both districts “will continue providing nutrition and other supports through the facilities. “
In addition, officials explained that teachers will offer televised and online lessons in an attempt to help families, the newspaper reported. Los Angeles Times.
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The Los Angeles Unified School District was under pressure to take more aggressive action, which officials had resisted until now because county health officials had not identified any confirmed COVID-19 cases linked to a LA campus. city until Thursday.
The districts of Los Angeles and San Diego will be added to those of San Francisco and Ventura, also in California, which had already ordered the closure of their educational centers.
In a message sent to schools this week, the California Department of Public Health recommended “taking steps to slow the spread of respiratory diseases, including COVID-19.”
Among other points, the Californian authorities asked the schools to exclude from their centers students, teachers and staff who “have a history of travel in the last 14 days” to a place identified as dangerous by the Centers for Control and Prevention of Diseases (CDC).
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According to the latest figures from the California Department of Health, there have been 198 cases of COVID-19 in the state, of which 4 resulted in the death of the patient.
These measures seek to avoid a possible contagion of coronavirus within schools, where students spend an average of six to eight hours a day.
Other states are anticipated to follow suit in the coming days, knocking millions of students out of classrooms in the coming weeks.
President Donald Trump declared on Thursday a state of emergency at the national level due to the spread of the coronavirus that to date has claimed the lives of at least 41 people, according to figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
With information from EFE, AP and NBC News.
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