New Mexico Covid from 9/8 to Today

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Lauren Coupland

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Oct 13, 2020, 4:52:10 PM10/13/20

to public....@laschools.net, Ellen Ben Naim, Dawn Jalbert, Melanie Colgan, s.boe...@laschools.net, Christine Bernstien, Kurt Steinhaus

Dr Steinhaus, President Ben-Naim, and School Board Members,

I know that you are receiving a lot of opinions on what should happen next week with very emotional pleas on all sides. But this is not a situation where the popular vote matters. What matters are facts, data, and public health policy.

The truth is the Covid-19 landscape in New Mexico has changed greatly since the September 8th School Board meeting where you voted to start hybrid on 10/19. On September 8th there were 44 new cases, a 1% positivity rate, and a seven day average of 109 cases per day. Contrast that with yesterday's numbers. On October 12th there were 390 new cases, a 7% positivity rate, and a seven day average of 390 cases per day. That seven day average was record breaking. As were the two days before. Additionally, another record was broken last week. The number of cases in New Mexico schools reached an all time high of 71 cases in one week. Several days during the week also broke records for highest daily case count.

At the 8/27 School Board Meeting, it was stated that Los Alamos County, and all of the surrounding counties were in the states "Green Zone." Given the percentage of out of district staff and students, that was deemed an essential part of readiness. While the NMDOH will not adjust their county colors until tomorrow, based on the data we are seeing, it is extremely likely that one or more of our surrounding counties will not be in the green come tomorrow.

I have included a PDF where I have compiled data slides from the NMDOH weekly modeling slides. I have juxtaposed the information posted on the day of your September 8th School Board Meeting, with the information posted this afternoon.

Changing course due to new information is a rational, responsible choice. If the state covid data for the last two weeks had been available to you on September 8th, would you have still chosen the 10/19 date to open?

I understand the disruption this will cause to schools and families to push back yet again. I truly wanted this to work. My kindergartener desperately needs in person services. But currently, the risk is too great. At her press conference last week, Governor Luhan-Grisham said "The virus is spreading exponentially and rapidly in the state." She went on to say "We still have time to get it under control, but it is really narrow. And if we don't do it right now, we are going to be in a situation where New Mexico will look like and be dealing with epicenter type, dramatic emergency issues."

This is not the time to be introducing more risk. Just today, the Governor amended the public health order. She has a press conference scheduled in 2 days, but she felt the situation was so dire, that she could not wait. If you vote to go on as scheduled, there is a high likelihood that new orders on Thursday will complicate the plan. Please don't put us in a place of scrambling over the weekend. Make the scienentific, data driven choice to wait.