Concord School District is proceeding with testing for Tuberculosis, pooled testing for COVID-19 and planning future COVID-19 vaccination clinics for students ages 5 to 11, once the Pfizer vaccine is approved for children.
Staff from the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services will be administering Tuberculosis tests at Concord High School this week, after a case of Tuberculosis was identified mid-October in an individual who was present at Concord High.
The district has conducted contact tracing and alerted everyone who might have had contact with the positive individual, Superintendent Kathleen Murphy said. Infectious disease control experts Dr. Elizabeth Talbot and Dr. James Noble said in October the case is a “likely low risk event,” made even less risky by the school’s universal mask mandate. TB testing will be offered all day Wednesday and on Friday from 9 a.m. to noon to those who have been identified as contacts. There will be more opportunities to be tested for TB on Dec. 15 and 17.
Pooled testing for COVID-19 began at Rundlett Middle School last week, according to a message from Murphy to the community on Friday. Rundlett experienced a “cluster” of three or more positive cases in one group last month and the district continues to see an uptick in positive student and staff cases. Pooled testing is when samples from 10-15 students are combined into a common “pool,” and then one lab test is used to detect COVID-19. Any pooled tests that return positive results will require each student in the sample group to undergo individual rapid tests to determine who is positive. The objective of pooling is to get swift, widespread results that can help a school stop or mitigate outbreaks.
Rundlett has seen 40 cases of COVID-19 among students and staff since the start of the school year, according to the district’s COVID-19 dashboard. Concord High has seen 35 positive cases, Abbot-Downing Elementary has seen 23 and Beaver Meadow Elementary has seen 18.
The Hopkinton School District is also moving forward with a plan to begin opt-in pooled testing, according to emails sent to parents from school principals this week. The district is hosting a Zoom webinar info session about pooled testing Tuesday at 6:30 p.m.
Murphy said that in Concord, rapid antigen testing, which school nurses and nurses from local agencies have been conducting on individuals, will be slowing down as test supplies are growing scarce.
“Regretfully, supplies of rapid tests are dwindling in the state, and we will be curtailing our testing program until we can secure test kits,” Murphy wrote. “I would be remiss if I did not express my disappointment that testing supplies are not available to the schools. The District has reached out to anyone who may have access to test kits but have come up short. I will let you know if circumstances change, and we can resume this critical testing.”
Concord School District is also preparing to partner with the Capitol Area Health Network to hold COVID-19 vaccination clinics at school for students ages 5-11, once CDC approves the use of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for children, an announcement that is expected to come this week. The Pfizer vaccine was authorized for emergency use in children ages 5-11 by U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last week. The Concord School District held similar optional vaccination clinics for high school students back in May, when Pfizer was first approved for people ages 16 and older.
“When the vaccine becomes available for students ages 5–11, the plan is to host vaccine clinics at the schools,” Murphy wrote. You will receive information as soon as we receive confirmation from the Health Network.”