COLUMBIA, S.C. — The South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) is updating its online reporting of COVID-19 associated with students and staff.
DHEC said this new reporting will help parents, caregivers and school officials have additional data about COVID-19’s impact on schools.
Starting Wednesday, DHEC’s school cases dashboard will be archived and replaced with a new weekly report for K-12 public, private, and charter schools that provides COVID-19 numbers as reported directly from schools.
This updated reporting includes the number of students and school staff who are isolated – meaning they are a positive COVID-19 case – and the number who are quarantined – meaning they are close contacts. The cumulative number of individuals quarantined and isolated since the start of the 2021-2022 school year will also be included.
“We appreciate the ongoing support and dedication of our school officials, teachers and school employees around the state during these challenging, stressful and emotional times,” Dr. Brannon Traxler, DHEC Public Health Director said. “We know that school officials consider many factors when they make decisions about classroom instruction, and we hope that including quarantine and isolation numbers in our statewide school reporting will provide an additional data set for informing school officials, as well as students, parents and caregivers, about the current status of COVID-19’s effect on our schools.”
While DHEC’s previous school cases dashboard was updated Tuesdays and Fridays, the webpage will now be updated once a week, on Wednesdays, with this expanded school reporting.
“As we work with all charter, public and private schools in the state to implement this new weekly reporting tool, the isolation and quarantine information may be incomplete initially, since the information is coming directly from our state’s schools,” Dr. Traxler said. “If your school’s data isn’t included in our DHEC reporting, please reach out and encourage your school to participate in this important public health effort.”
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