Kelly Hayes
The Hillsborough County School District has reported 5,511 cases of COVID-19 since the school year started on Aug. 10 — impacting 9,281 students and staff, or nearly 4% of the district.
Those impacted are required to isolate at home after contact with a student or staff member who tested positive for the virus. The district provides a dashboard updated daily on the number of COVID-19 cases reported by students and staff members.
From Aug. 23 through Aug. 30, the school district confirmed 2,603 cases of COVID-19, made up of 332 employees and 2,589 students. That’s a slight increase from the district’s second week, which reported 2,233 cases of COVID-19, including 319 students and 1,914 employees.
The cases remained high throughout the week, with the most cases reported on Monday at 685.
From there, cases gradually declined, reporting 503 cases on Tuesday, 490 on Wednesday, 459 on Thursday and 344 on Friday, the majority each day being student cases.
The school with the highest reported caseload for students was Mulrennan Middle School in Valrico, which reported 46 student cases this week along with two employee cases.
As for employees, the district office reported 24 new staff cases.
To note, students and faculty are tested through a Department of Health testing site or personal doctor, neither district tests at schools. The district dashboards also do not provide data on the hospitalization of student/teacher COVID-19 cases.
Hillsborough’s crushing numbers prompted the district School Board to implement a mandatory mask mandate the week prior, without the state-required opt-out option for parents. At the meeting, the School Board determined the opt-out policy was not working. Superintendent Addison Davis said 28,000 parents had filled out the paperwork to opt-out and other parents were refusing to fill out the paperwork citing Gov. Ron DeSantis’ executive order banning mandates.
On Friday, a judge struck down the DeSantis administration’s order banning mask mandates in public schools. The order won’t take effect until the judge issues a written order.
However, the ruling ends what is likely just the first act of the legal battle over masks in schools. DeSantis has vowed to appeal the ruling.
In the meantime, COVID-19 cases in Tampa Bay appear to be on the rise after a week of slow case growth.
Hillsborough County confirmed 11,811 cases of COVID-19 Aug. 20-26, according to the latest Florida Department of Health weekly report. That’s up from the week prior, when the county reported 11,161 cases.
