3 Q&A with U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams

AKASH BALENALLI EDITOR-IN-CHIEF MARINA QU NEWS EDITOR & DESIGNER

FAMILY TIES — U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams and his wife, Lacey Adams, have three children in FCPS: Eli, an 8th grader at Longfellow Middle School, Millie, a fourth grader at Spring Hill Elementary School and Caden, a freshman at McLean High School. (Photo courtesy of Lacey Adams)

U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams: We know that D.C., Maryland and Virginia are the three leading areas, and the DMV area overall is the leading area in the country in terms of cases. Most everywhere else, outside of small outbreaks and clusters, is trending down, but we’ve just been surprised at...how resistant the DMV has been to leveling off. We still are trying to figure out why that is. We know a lot of it is related to the fact that we have many essential workers in our area... We also are just an area where a lot of people come in and out from the rest of the country...so it’s a place that is ripe for importation of new cases of coronavirus. It’s critically important that we’re aware of our data, that we are particularly aware of how we can protect ourselves and that we are vigilant about doing the things that we know will keep ourselves and our communities safe and slow the spread.

I do have concerns when you look at the data... We want to see a downward trend in cases—we don’t want people reopening if case counts are going up. We want people to have hospital capacity, so that if they do see new cases, they have the ability to take care of these people without denying them a ventilator or denying them a bed. We also want to make sure they have the public health capacity to be able to test people and to be able to do case contact tracing... That’s the way they contain disease... It’s not a light switch. It’s not one day you’re closed and the next day you’re open. It’s how do we gradually reopen in a data-driven and evidence-based way so that we protect as many people as possible as we reopen our country?

I think schools will reopen in the fall in most places in the country. That’s just my personal opinion. I think it’s important that we think through how we make that happen... We want to make sure we’re acknowledging the public health tenet of physical and social distancing. We don’t want everyone crowded together in a tight space that is likely to spread coronavirus. We want to make sure we have the opportunity for people to practice good hygiene, so you’re going to see a whole lot more hand sanitizer...

We may even see staggered school. Many places have already put into place plans where instead of everyone coming back to school all at once, on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, Group A goes to school, and on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday—and yes, there are some places that are looking at Saturday school, too—you will have Group B go to school. That will better allow for social distancing.

I do think school will open in the fall in most places. I don’t think it will look, in most places, like school traditionally has looked for us. But I do think we’ll gradually work our way back to normal with social distancing, with good hygiene and by protecting the vulnerable.

One of the other concerns that we have is that it’s one thing to acknowledge that young people actually are much lower risk for coronavirus than older people, but it’s a very different topic of discussion to consider the fact that many of our teachers who have to be there and teach actually fall into the atrisk categories in terms of being older and in terms of having chronic medical conditions. So it’s not just about the students—it’s about everyone who has to be there for reopening the school, including your cafeteria workers, the security officers, your custodians, your

teachers. We have to make sure it’s a safe environment for all of them too.

Well, extracurricular activities are going to be tough, because everything that we do in life has a risk and a benefit... As a parent, I definitely see the benefit of my child going to school, so I am more likely to embrace that risk-benefit ratio, but it starts to get harder to make the case that your kid has to play football, or that your kid has to be part of chess club, or that your kid has to be part of this extracurricular activity that by definition is not something that everyone has to do. I think there’s going to be a higher threshold for us really engaging in some of these activities.

When you look at sports, it’s impossible to play football while practicing social or physical distancing. So that may be a scenario where you say we have to test everyone before they’re allowed to participate in an activity where they’re not going to be able to respect social distancing or where they’re going to be very close to one another... I think it’s going to be different for each and every extracurricular activity, looking at risk and benefit, looking at precautions and looking at other models out there, but we’ll gradually start to reopen them just as we reopen school.

That is tough to say right now... One part of this is going to be looking at the burden of disease and making sure things are trending down. Another part of this is going to be me as a parent feeling comfortable that the school is taking appropriate precautions to protect my child and other children. So again looking at what are they doing to allow for social distancing? What are they doing to allow for proper hygiene? Are they going to have people wear face coverings in environments where they’re not able to practice social distancing? What are they doing to test people so that they understand whether or not they’ve got an uptick in cases? And then what are they going to do, most importantly, to let parents know if there is a case that they found at school? ... It’s not impossible for us to get there. We just all need to sit down and think intelligently through how we do this in a way that protects people.

I am very worried as Surgeon General about the impact of social distancing on mental health... Social distancing doesn’t have to mean social isolation... I would say to the students of McLean that now it’s more important than ever that you reach out to your friends through digital means...and let them know that you’re thinking about them and that you care about them. It’s also important to try to have some semblance of a routine... Physical activity actually helps a lot of people deal with stress and also helps people alleviate boredom.

It’s also important to avoid [abusing] substances. And I say that to [McLean students] knowing that they’re illegal and you shouldn’t be using them anyway but that a lot of people are. When you look at Juuling and vaping, it is very important to understand that that has a negative impact on you in the best of times and, particularly when you’re isolated, can affect your mental health. Drinking alcohol is definitely something that young people should avoid, [in addition to] marijuana... If you have concerns, [you can call] 1-800- 273-TALK, the national helpline available for anyone, anytime, 24/7.

I would reiterate...that we have sacrificed a lot to stay at home and slow the spread, and what we don’t want to do is negate all of that sacrifice that we’ve made up until this point... A lot of the folks who you see going to the beaches are people who think they are not at risk. The fact is that anyone can be at risk for coronavirus, but you also want to remember that your actions have an impact on other people out there. While you may not get sick, you may bring it home to your grandmother or to your baby brother or sister or to someone else who’s vulnerable, and you just quite frankly would never forgive yourself if you were the reason someone else actually got sick, got injured, died because of coronavirus. I ask people to remember that. Remember that we’re all in this together. And we will get through this. We do expect that we’ll have a vaccine within the next year. We are seeing the development of better medications and therapeutics to treat people, and we are seeing these counts go down. This sacrifice isn’t for forever—it’s just for the time being, and we will reopen, and the sooner we do the things that we know will slow the spread, and the more effectively and comprehensively we do those things, the sooner, actually, we will reopen.

What I want them to know is that I am incredibly proud of their response to our calls to stay at home and to slow the spread. The truth is that almost every model out there predicted things to be much worse even than what they are. We came in under...most of those projections because people really did do their part and stayed at home. People were wearing face coverings. A lot of people...talk about the bad, but there are a lot of people out there doing the right thing and, really, they’ve tangibly contributed to fewer deaths and fewer people getting coronavirus than what most experts originally predicted, so that’s something I want people to know. I want them to know that now is not the time to forget about all the things that we did, that we need to be careful and measured in our reopening, because otherwise it will negate all of the effort, all of the sacrifices you’ve made up to this point. It’s important that as we reopen, it’s measured, it’s data-driven, it’s done in phases and we don’t rush, because what we don’t want to do is undo all the great efforts that the people of the McLean community have put into slowing the spread of this disease.

To read the full interview, visit thehighlandernews.com