SC schools didn’t know about COVID-19 rapid testing plan. Here’s how they’ll handle it
South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster didn’t give his state’s Department of Education or school districts a heads up before last week’s announcement that rapid COVID-19 testing at schools would begin after Thanksgiving — but with only a few days before students return from Thanksgiving break, those agencies are scrambling to put together a plan to begin testing.
The DOE will begin distributing the tests next week, spokesman Ryan Brown said Tuesday.
McMaster, who has repeatedly called for schools to return to in-person learning five days a week, signed an executive order Wednesday, The State reported, authorizing South Carolina’s Department of Health and Environmental Control to provide all public schools with rapid antigen tests supplied by the federal government for use by students and school staff.
”School districts throughout our state have shown that we can safely educate our children in the classroom, and these tests will give students, teachers, and faculty members another layer of defense against the COVID-19 virus,” McMaster said in a statement Wednesday announcing his order.
The start date for testing will vary by school district based on when they receive the tests. But the districts also must complete training for staff, mostly school nurses and athletic trainers, to administer the tests to those showing coronavirus symptoms.
“For some districts, that could be in place as soon as the week of Nov. 30, but for others it may be a few more weeks,” Brown said. “We don’t want to rush them into doing this until they feel comfortable.”
The state has received about 1.5 million Abbott BinaxNOW rapid antigen tests from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service. However, only 220,200 of those are allocated to schools, DHEC spokeswoman Laura Renwick said. The rest are slated for nursing homes, assisted living facilities, home health/hospice operations and historically Black colleges and universities.
Brown said districts will receive rapid tests for about 10% of their total staff and student population, with the possibility to get more tests each month.
School districts will be able to pick up the tests from DHEC’s Columbia warehouse during weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. The tests will be delivered to districts that cannot come to the Columbia warehouse.
What will testing look like?
Parents must consent to their children being tested, and school districts can opt out of receiving rapid tests, Brown said Tuesday.
According to DOE guidance sent to Beaufort County School District, in-person staff and students are eligible for testing if they would “otherwise be excluded” from attending school for showing one or more of the following COVID-19 symptoms: coughing, shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, a fever above 100.4 degrees, and loss of taste or smell.
School nurses and athletic trainers can deem students or staff members eligible for testing if they show two or more of the following symptoms: headache, fatigue, sore throat, congestion or rhinorrhea, myalgia, nausea, vomiting or diarrhea.
The rapid tests take about 15 minutes to complete, and positive results are considered “probable” COVID-19 cases by DHEC that will need to be followed by a traditional test. All testing will be administered or supervised by a school staff member.
“These test kits are very simple to use,” Brown said. “A high school kid could administer it themselves. A younger child would need a nurse or someone with a medical background like an athletic trainer to administer it for them.”
Brown said the rapid-test provider Abbot has put together training videos for school personnel to administer the kits. School districts will be responsible for reporting test results to DHEC and disposing of the kits, but most schools “already have infrastructure” to do both, he said.
Brown said one piece of the plan to roll out testing at schools is still missing: a universal consent form for school districts to give to parents, which was part of McMaster’s announcement. Brown said that in a Monday call with the governor’s office, the DOE didn’t get “a straight answer” on the form.
“It’s been our understanding that DHEC and the external counsel and the governor’s legal team have been working on that,” Brown said. “But we’ve yet to receive it.”
This story was originally published November 25, 2020 at 1:10 PM.