Assessment of US Public School District Policies for Pandemic Preparedness and Implications for COVID-19 Response Activities

Details

• Alternative Title:
  Disaster Med Public Health Prep
• Personal Author:
  Kersten, Cassandra A. ; Chamberlain, Allison T. ; Jones, Sherry Everett ; Uzicanin, Amra ; Ahmed, Faruque
• Description:
  Objectives:
  
  To describe school district preparedness for school closures and other relevant strategies before the COVID-19 pandemic.
  
  Methods:
  
  A stratified random sample of 957 public school districts from the 50 US states and the District of Columbia were surveyed between October 2015 and August 2016. The response rates for the questionnaires were as follows: Healthy and Safe School Environment, Crisis Preparedness Module (60%, N = 572), Nutrition Services (63%, N = 599), and Health Services (64%, N = 613). Data were analyzed using descriptive and regression techniques.
  
  Results:
  
  Most school districts had procedures that would facilitate the implementation of school closures (88.7%). Fewer districts had plans for ensuring continuity of education (43.0%) or feeding students during closure (33.8%). The prevalence of continuity of education plans was lower in the Midwest than the Northeast (adjusted prevalence ratio [aPR] = 0.68; 95% CI: 0.51–0.90). Presence of plans for feeding students was higher in high-poverty than low-poverty districts (aPR = 1.41; 95% CI: 1.01–1.99) and in large districts than small districts (aPR = 2.06; 95% CI: 1.37–3.09).
  
  Conclusions:
  
  Understanding factors associated with having comprehensive emergency plans could help decision makers to target assistance during the current COVID-19 pandemic and for future planning purposes.
  
  
• Subjects:
  Article COVID-19 Health Policy Humans Influenza Influenza Pandemic Pandemic Preparedness Pandemics Public Policy School Closure Schools United States

  More +
• Source:
  Disaster Med Public Health Prep. 16(4):1362-1368
• Pubmed ID:
  33750506
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC7985647
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• Funding:
  CC999999/ImCDC/Intramural CDC HHSUnited States/
• Volume:
  16
• Issue:
  4
• Collection(s):
  CDC Public Access
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:6286661ea01491dd214b78b4de3ed05a4fdf396ddd3b7cf09614d059b45e0ffe
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/107356/cdc_107356_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 101.81 KB ]