New Georgia coronavirus outbreak among school staff doesn't speak well for reopening
School Students (Ina Fassbender AFP)

It took just a day for 260 members of the faculty and staff of Georgia's largest school district to be called out for the coronavirus after in-person meetings this week.


According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 260 employees tested positive or were out due to contact with an infected person, Gwinnett County Public School announced.

"Through tracing, we know that the majority of these cases are the result of community spread, meaning we have people who have called in to report who have not been at school or work," said Gwinnett spokeswoman Sloan Roach.

The school district is in a city with the largest rate of COVID-19 in Georgia, at 17,781 positive cases.

It was one of the reasons that teacher Ashley Newman said that she was forced to resign from her beloved job at a Gwinnett elementary school. Her young daughter's daycare has so many children that it's impossible to keep them distanced. So, she decided to stay home with her daughter.

"I applied for the government funding where I could get two-thirds of my pay for 12 weeks, but I was denied," she said.

Even without children in the schools, the adults spread the virus so quickly that with children, the virus is likely to spread to even more in the community.

Read the full report in the AJC.