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On September 14, 2021, the CDC issued Health Alert Network (HAN) Health Advisory #451 to alert public health departments, healthcare professionals, first responders, poison control centers, laboratories, and the public to the increased availability of cannabis products containing delta-8 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and the potential for adverse events due to insufficient labeling of products containing THC and cannabidiol (CBD).
Effective Thursday September 23, 2021, the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists (CSTE) guidance, Standardized COVID-19 K-12 School Surveillance Guidance for Classification of Clusters and Outbreaks (Version 1: August 6, 2021) will be utilized for reporting school outbreaks and clusters in the LHD SITREP. Definitions of a K-12 school-associated COVID-19 case and standardized K-12 school-transmission are outlined. The CSTE guidance provides standard criteria with which to determine whether a school is having an outbreak or cluster of cases. All K-12 school-associated clusters and school-associated outbreaks meeting the criteria below should be reported in the LHD SITREP.
K-12 school-associated COVID-19 case (confirmed or probable) is a student, teacher, or staff member physically present in the school setting or participated in a school sanctioned extracurricular activity
a. Within 14 days prior to illness onset or a positive test result OR
b. Within 10 days after illness onset or a positive test result
Standardized K-12 school-transmission definition
A subset of school-associated cases where the most likely place of exposure is determined to be the school setting or a school-sanctioned extracurricular activity.
Standardized K-12 school-associated cluster description
Multiple cases comprising at least 10% of students, teachers, or staff within a specified core group OR at least three (3) cases within a specified core group meeting criteria for a probable or confirmed school-associated COVID-19 case with symptom onset or positive test result within 14 days of each other, AND NO likely known epidemiologic link to a case outside of the school setting.
Standardized K-12 school-associated outbreak description
Multiple cases comprising at least 10% of students, teachers, or staff within a specified core group OR at least three (3) cases within a specified core group meeting criteria for a probable or confirmed school-associated COVID-19 case with symptom onset or positive test result within 14 days of each other; who were not identified as close contacts of each other in another setting (i.e., household) outside of the school setting; AND epidemiologically linked in the school setting or a school-sanctioned extracurricular activity.
Additional information can be located here: CSTE-Standardized-COVID-19-K-12-School-Surveillance-Guidance-for-Classification-of-Clusters-and-Outbreaks.pdf.
The CHECC has updated the school outbreak reporting tool for the 5 multi-region LHDs (Barry-Eaton DHD, Branch-Hillsdale, Central Michigan, Mid-Michigan, and DHD10). The updated reporting tool has a column to enter the preparedness region in which the outbreak occurred. This revised reporting tool for multi-region LHDs goes into effect with the September 16 LHD Sitrep.
Submitters will note there is a table that shows what counties in the multi-region LHD fall into which preparedness region to help in determining the appropriate region for each outbreak reported; this table can be found below the line list.
This is information that has been collected all along, but the CHECC was looking for a more efficient method for collecting this information to reduce redundancy in data entry by LHDs and reduce problems with data validation after submission.
The other 40 LHDs should continue using the current school outbreak reporting tool.
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