Influence of Mask Wearing during COVID-19 Surge and Non-Surge Time Periods in Two K-12 Public School Districts in Georgia, USA.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Into the third year of the COVID-19 pandemic and the second year of in-person learning for many K-12 schools in the United States, the benefits of mitigation strategies in this setting are still unclear. We compare COVID-19 cases in school-aged children and adolescents between a school district with a mandatory mask-wearing policy to one with an optional mask-wearing policy, during and after the peak period of the Delta variant wave of infection.

Methods

COVID-19 cases during the Delta variant wave (August 2021) and post the wave (October 2021) were obtained from public health records. Cases of K-12 students, stratified by grade level (elementary, middle, and high school) and school districts across two counties, were included in the statistical and spatial analys

SUBMITTER: Lin X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10177845 | biostudies-literature | 2023 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature