Covid outbreak at California elementary school blamed on parents who sent infected children to school

After parents of two children at Neil Cummins Elementary School in Corte Madera, Calif., failed to follow Marin County Health Department Covid guidelines, eight children have been infected with Covid and 75 are in quarantine. 

The Marin Independent Journal reports that the parents, who have not been identified, were notified the week of Nov. 8 by the health and human services department that one of their two children had tested positive.

The parents were told to keep both children home and to notify the school. Instead, they notified no one and sent their children to school for seven more days, and they did not return multiple calls from public health contact tracers.

The school district did not find out about the protocol breach until Nov. 18, when administrators got a call from Marin County’s public health official asking why the school had not yet uploaded the positive case to the school’s database.

Brett Geithman, superintendent of the Larkspur-Corte Madera School District, says the district will take “corrective action” against the parents. 

“These are elementary school students who were sent to school by their parents,” he said. “They should face no consequences.”

Once the district became aware of the situation, it notified all parents of the incident. On Nov. 19, the last school day before Thanksgiving break, the siblings’ two classes were tested — about 50 children — and all of them were advised to go into modified quarantine over the 10-day break. A third class, with 25 students, was added to the modified quarantine after an additional positive case was found there.

The modified quarantine meant the students were not allowed to travel or attend family gatherings or group activities through Nov. 28.

No staff members tested positive.