MELBOURNE, Fla. – Before the Brevard County School Board voted to keep masks optional for teachers and kids on Tuesday, board members asked a group of doctors like pediatrician Dr. Mary Ulrich about the increased number of COVID-19 cases and the variants.
“The majority of children, though, seem to not be very sick or symptomatic of it that we see,’’ Ulrich told the board Tuesday night.
Ulrich of Pediatrics in Brevard reports nearly 100 children have been treated for COVID-19 in the past month, most in the past two weeks.
Ulrich said if any are very sick, they’re told to go to the emergency room.
Brevard County’s largest hospital chain Health First, reported Thursday another record of 330 COVID patients but said none right now are children.
In the meantime in Orlando, AdventHealth said its system has about a dozen child patients, an all-time high.
“COVID pneumonia is the most common presentation of the disease in children and as consequence, many of the children are on supplemental oxygen, for example,” Chief Medical Officer Dr. Michael Keating said.
Just three days into the new year, Brevard Public Schools said staff from district headquarters is being sent to Sabal Elementary School in Melbourne because of COVID cases.
A district spokesperson did not say if the cases are teachers or students or how many there are.
The school was open Thursday.