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Texas Medical Association COVID-19 experts urge testing in schools

The TMA says testing children and adults could prevent campus outbreaks, create safer school environments and slow community spread.

The Texas Medical Association is recommending schools use rapid antigen testing, along with other campus safety measures to detect early signs of COVID-19.

The TMA says a comprehensive screening program could help identify COVID-19 cases in children and adults who don’t have symptoms so schools could quickly isolate them. This would help prevent campus outbreaks and further spread in the community.

“Testing along with the isolation of infectious students and school staff will reduce everybody’s anxiety level,” said Charles Lerner, MD, a San Antonio epidemiologist and infectious disease specialist and member of the TMA COVID-19 Task Force.

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A positive rapid antigen test can confirm the presence of infection, but a negative test does not rule out the possibility that the person has COVID-19.

“Because of the level of false negatives and the occasional false positives, we need to be aware that this kind of screening program is not a panacea and does not replace diagnostic testing which is used by physicians to confirm the cause of symptoms,” Dr. Lerner said. “But a comprehensive school infection plan represents a very small step forward in getting children back to school.”

The recommendation comes from the Texas Medical Association (TMA) School Reopening Workgroup, which includes physician members of the TMA COVID-19 Task Force, Committee on Infectious Diseases, and Committee on Child and Adolescent Health, and local health authorities from throughout the state.

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