A St. Theresa School, Kalihi, preschooler on the first day of school in August 2021. (HCH Photo: Anna Weaver)
By Anna Weaver
Hawaii Catholic Herald
The Hawaii Catholic Herald checked in with superintendent of Hawaii Catholic Schools Llewellyn Young in early October to ask about the COVID-19 case numbers in parochial and private Catholic schools in Hawaii. Here are some highlights of his response.
At the end of the 2020-2021 school year, 40 total positive COVID-19 cases had been reported to the HCS office. But the Delta variant and rise in the number of coronavirus cases across the state has led to more students and employees getting sick with the virus.
“Within the first quarter of the school year, we’ve had more cases reported than the entire year last year,” Young said. “All known cases were infected outside of schools.”
Every Catholic school in the state has had at least one positive COVID-19 case so far this school year, either student or employee. Larger schools have reported more cases, with one school having more than “20 positive student cases during the first two months of the school year.”
While the case numbers are much higher this academic year, Young said that there hasn’t been “a single case of confirmed spread in a Catholic school.”
He said that one of the “most alarming trends is the number of positive cases in preschools and early learning centers,” and that as a result, most preschools have “tightened their COVID protocols to keep their campus communities safe.”
“ALL schools are managing their cases VERY well, and their mitigation strategies to minimize and prevent the spread of the virus on campus are working,” Young added.
Individual schools are reporting cases and information to the Hawaii State Department of Health to help with contact tracing. Some schools also track positive family member cases.
The state of Hawaii saw a sharp uptick in positive COVID cases starting in late July. While numbers are falling again, they have not gone down to the levels the state had during the state’s first “peak” at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in spring 2020.
Hawaii has had more than 820 deaths statewide since the start of the pandemic. Almost 450,000 Hawaii residents are not yet vaccinated and there were more than 3,700 active cases statewide with a 7-day positivity rate of 3.2% as of Oct. 7, 2021, as reported by the Hawaii State Department of Health.
