Acting Medical Officer of Health Doctor Shanker Nesathurai said he will not rule out the use of rapid antigen COVID-19 testing for schools here, but he has his reservations.
On Tuesday, the Ontario Chief Medical Officer of Health said the tests would be available to asymptomatic students at schools in high-risk areas of the province. Doctor Kieran Moore called it another tool in Ontario's toolbox to lower transmission rates and keep schools open.
Moore said he was leaving it up to local public health officials to ask for the tests. They would be voluntary. Parents would administer them at home to their asymptomatic children before they go to school.
Nesathurai told reporters Wednesday testing of asymptomatic students would have only a limited role in managing the pandemic.
"And the reason is that when you screen people who don't have symptoms, you're likely many times to have people test positive who in fact don't have COVID," he explained.
Nesathurai said the PCR testing done at assessment clinics is more accurate.
Moore did not ignore that point during his comments the day before, saying those that test positive with a rapid antigen test would still be required to get PCR testing before returning to the classroom.
Until Tuesday, the Ontario government did not recommend rapid testing in schools, but Moore said reviewing data from the U.K. and the U.S. convinced him it could be helpful.
So far, Nesathurai said the Windsor-Essex County Health Unit has not made any determination one way or the other.
"We have not made any firm decisions, and we definitely have to do that in consultation with our school board colleagues," he said.
Meanwhile, trustees with the Greater Essex County District School Board passed a motion to write the health unit a letter asking it to lift restrictions on extracurricular activities.
Before school started, the health unit recommended a pause on those, and earlier this week, Nesathurai indicated he was not yet prepared to recommend lifting restrictions. He said students under 12 need to be protected from infection, vaccination rates for those 12 and up are low, and the over 200 cohorts dismissed already.
The health unit reported 46 new cases of COVID-19 and two more deaths related to the virus on Wednesday morning.
A woman in her 50s and another in her 60s passed away on Tuesday.
The total number of cases on Wednesday is a big jump from Tuesday's 11, but not inconsistent with the number of cases reported daily over the past week.
Of the new infections, 23 people caught COVID-19 from having close contact with a confirmed case, nine caught the virus in the community, and three are connected to outbreaks. Eleven are under investigation.
The number of active cases across the region now totals 260.
Five schools, Ecole elementaire Louise-Charron, Ecole elementaire catholique George P. Vanier, Ecole elementaire catholic Sainte-Ursule, Sandiwch West Public School, and St. Andre French Immersion Catholic School all have outbreaks of the virus.
