Each Of Oconee County Schools Reported COVID Case Since Aug. 4

From the beginning of classes and through just before noon on Thursday, Oconee County Schools has recorded 40 cases of COVID-19, all but three of them among students.

Seventeen of the 37 COVID-19 positive students were in kindergarden through fifth grade, 13 were in the system’s two middle schools, and seven were at the two high schools.

Two of the staff cases were at North Oconee High School, and the third was at Oconee County High School.

The counts are for a six-and-a-half day period of actual classes but for eight and a half days total. In the seven days ending on Aug. 11, Oconee County schools recorded 34 active cases.

Oconee County Schools last year reported counts on Fridays for the seven days leading up to Friday and reported its most active cases–40--on Jan. 15. The weekly count exceeded 28 active cases only that one time.

All but two of the 40 cases reported since the beginning of the school year remain active as of noon on Thursday.

These data on COVID-19 cases come not from Oconee County Schools directly, which is refusing to release any data on the disease to the public this year, but indirectly from parents who obtained the data via an open records request of the schools.

Anisa Sullivan Jimenez, director of Communications for Oconee County Schools, confirmed that the system is reporting all its cases to the Georgia Department of Public Health but keeping “a record of cases as well.”

For more on this story, pleases go to Oconee County Observations.