COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - Schools across Ohio will stay closed for the remainder of the school year while classes continue remotely, Republican Gov. Mike DeWine announced Monday.
DeWine, who was the first governor in the nation to shutter schools statewide, said his latest decision stems from concern for the continued safety of students, teachers and communities. He said returning students to their classrooms could lead to new cases of COVID-19.
DeWine said teachers and administrators also worried that another disruption to a school year already interrupted by the coronavirus might negatively affect students, who need continuity.
“We have to think about the risk to teachers, students, and our communities,” DeWine said.
The governor said no decision has been made about the fall but said a blend of in-person and online learning might be an option for districts. He urged state and local education leaders to be considering plans to address the needs of students with disabilities, those with health risks, those lacking internet access and those who might not have a stable home life.
Other developments Monday related to the virus in Ohio:
PRISONS
Ohio inmates now make up more than one in four of the state’s coronavirus cases following a spike in identified infections as universal testing takes place inside three state prisons.
Figures released Monday show 1,950 positive tests at Marion Correctional Facility in north-central Ohio, out of about 2,500 total inmates, according to the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
In addition, 154 employees at Marion have tested positive, out of a total of about 350 workers, which includes about 295 guards. One Marion prison guard died earlier this month.
Cases also spiked at a second prison, Pickaway Correctional Facility, where 1,163 have tested positive out of a population of about 2,000, according to Monday’s data.
DeWine said he would look into reports of inmates being placed back into normal living situations without social distancing while awaiting delayed test results.
Systemwide, 3,312 inmates have tested positive and eight have died, including six at Pickaway. Even the head of the prison guards’ union, Christopher Mabe, is in self-quarantine after his wife, a guard at Lorain Correctional Institution, tested positive.
The spike in prison infections sent the state’s tally of cases on Monday to nearly 13,000, which includes 509 deaths and more than 2,600 hospitalizations.
Inmate rights groups have called on the Republican governor to release thousands of the state’s 49,000 inmates to prevent the spread of the virus - among them Policy Matters Ohio, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Ohio Organizing Collaborative and the Juvenile Justice Coalition.
To date, DeWine has released just seven inmates, and requested a review of 198 others, most of them elderly, with sentences running out soon; pregnant inmates; and women with children living with them behind bars.
Members of the Ohio National Guard are helping staff the Pickaway and Marion facilities, and are also assisting at the federal prison in Elkton in eastern Ohio, where six inmates have died.
On April 10, DeWine announced that facility-wide testing would be done at Marion, Pickaway and the Franklin Medical Center in Columbus. At that time, 36 inmates and 58 employees had tested positive, most at Marion and Pickaway.
That decision came two weeks after a Marion employee first tested positive on March 29. Although the prison system assessed every Marion staff member afterward, it was up to inmates to tell medical staff if they were ill, according to an email the prisons director sent to DeWine’s office on March 30.
“Nothing of concern has surfaced,” prisons director Annette Chambers-Smith said of the inmate situation in the March 30 email, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press through a records’ request.
For most people, the virus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up in a couple of weeks. Older adults and people with existing health problems are at higher risk of more severe illness, including pneumonia, or death.
ECONOMY
Protesters returned to the Ohio Statehouse Monday where about 200 people carried signs with messages like “Sick=Stay Home, Healthy=Go to Work” and chanted “Open Ohio Now.” Several carried semiautomatic rifles.
“Whether you think the virus is overblown or not, the way things were deemed essential or nonessential is getting out of hand,” said Mike Chancelor, 49, an airline pilot from Columbus, carrying a sign that said “Freedom is Essential.” Chancelor said it’s not right his wife can’t undergo a skin cancer treatment while elective surgeries are prohibited.
DATA
DeWine said a statewide list of cases by nursing homes was taken down because of inaccuracies. It will be back Wednesday along with cases broken down between residents and employees, and nursing home deaths by county, but not by facility.
DeWine also said new data coming soon will show the number of healthcare workers who tested positive by hospital.
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