It's a bizarro world where wanting people to have the facts about risks not just to kids but to the adults around them gets you called "evil", "Psychopath" "devil spawn" "stupid" and any number of other names. Let's be really clear: I have kids, and... 1/x

I want more than anything else for schools to open. And I'd be delighted to send mine to school if were like those European countries people *love* to shout at me about. With low community transmission, extensive testing, masks for everyone and physical distancing 2/x

But that is, alas, not our status. Telling me about the same 5 studies over and over and over doesn't change the fact that we are trying to compare apples and oranges when we try to compare with those other countries. 3/x

Can we have zero transmission and no cases if we can replicate all of those conditions? We'll at least have a better shot. But right now, with our epidemic where it is, the situation is completely different. 4/x

We squandered months of time this spring when we could have contained this epidemic and made it an easy choice to send kids to school. Without those precautions in place, it's a risk. Not to most kids (still risky for some), but to all the adults around them. 5/x

It's possible kids get infected less often than adults, but it's not zero. It's possible kids transmit to others less than adults. But it's not zero.
With our epidemic at the level it is, even a small contribution to overall transmission could have a big impact. 6/x

Again, I'd give anything for my 11-year-old to be grumpy with his friends again, and for my 8-year-old to giggle with hers, but we'll just need to wait longer till we have this thing under control. They get it. I hope you do, too. 7/7