BOSTON — The mask requirement in schools has been extended out another month.
Public school children aged 5 and older and all staff will have to wear masks inside school buildings until at least Nov. 1, with certain exemptions.
The state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education in August declared "exigent circumstances" and authorized the Commissioner Jeffrey Riley to institute universal masking based on a sudden rise in COVID-19 cases throughout the state near the end of July.
The mandate was put in place until at least Oct. 1. On Monday, Riley determined to extend the mask requirement "after consulting with medical experts and state health officials."
The mask mandate for vaccinated individuals will be lifted when 80 percent or more of all students and staff in a school are vaccinated.
This would not be able to be applied in elementary schools because children under the age of 12 cannot yet be vaccinated.
Counties are now ranging between 63 and 104 percent of eligible individuals vaccinated, with Berkshire County about 73 percent.
Vaccination of those 16-19 are varied throughout the state, Chelsea a high at 81 percent , according to Riley's presentation to the DESE Board of Education. There are also high rates of vaccination for that age group in Berkshire County as of Sept. 16, with low-rate outliers in the hilltowns and parts of South Berkshires.
In addition to masking, schools are also using social distancing of at least 3-feet and testing protocols, including the "test and stay" guidelines that can reduce quarantine times for those exposed to the novel coronavirus, to maintain in-person learning.
According to Riley, the test-and-stay protocol saved roughly 1,000 in-person school days last week, including 450 on Friday alone.
The mask guidance hasn't changed: It calls for mask breaks outside or when classroom windows can be opened, and when eating. Masks are also required on buses as part of the federal mandate requiring masks on public transportation.
Pfizer and BioNTech have been reporting good trial results in vaccine doses for children ages 5 to 11. These results have been submitted to the Food and Drug Administration.
Currently, only the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is fully approved by the FDA for use in individuals age 16 and older; other vaccines and use in those 12 to 16 is by FDA emergency authorization. Booster shots for the Pfizer vaccine were authorized last week for certain at-risk groups.
Massachusetts is one of the leading regions in vaccination rates at about 72 percent, not far behind Vermont and Puerto Rico.
The Baker administration has mandated vaccines for 42,000 state employees and health care workers but has declined to order one for educators despite support from the Massachusetts Teachers Association. Public colleges and universities, and many private ones, have instituted vaccine and masking mandates.
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State Fire Marshal: New Tracking Tool Identifies 50 Lithium-Ion Battery Fires
STOW, Mass. — The Massachusetts Department of Fire Services' new tool for tracking lithium-ion battery fires has helped to identify 50 such incidents in the past six months, more than double the annual average detected by a national fire data reporting system, said State Fire Marshal Jon M. Davine.
The Department of Fire Services launched its Lithium-Ion Battery Fire Investigative Checklist on Oct. 13, 2023. It immediately went into use by the State Police Fire & Explosion Investigation Unit assigned to the State Fire Marshal's office, and local fire departments were urged to adopt it as well.
Developed by the DFS Fire Safety Division, the checklist can be used by fire investigators to gather basic information about fires in which lithium-ion batteries played a part. That information is then entered into a database to identify patterns and trends.
"We knew anecdotally that lithium-ion batteries were involved in more fires than the existing data suggested," said State Fire Marshal Davine. "In just the past six months, investigators using this simple checklist have revealed many more incidents than we've seen in prior years."
Prior to the checklist, the state's fire service relied on battery fire data reported to the Massachusetts Fire Incident Reporting System (MFIRS), a state-level tool that mirrors and feeds into the National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS). NFIRS tracks battery fires but does not specifically gather data on the types of batteries involved. Some fields do not require the detailed information that Massachusetts officials were seeking, and some fires may be coded according to the type of device involved rather than the type of battery. Moreover, MFIRS reports sometimes take weeks or months to be completed and uploaded.
"Investigators using the Lithium-Ion Battery Fire Checklist are getting us better data faster," said State Fire Marshal Davine. "The tool is helpful, but the people using it are the key to its success."
From 2019 to 2023, an average of 19.4 lithium-ion battery fires per year were reported to MFIRS – less than half the number identified by investigators using the checklist over the past six months. The increase since last fall could be due to the growing number of consumer devices powered by these batteries, increased attention by local fire investigators, or other factors, State Fire Marshal Davine said. For example, fires that started with another item but impinged upon a battery-powered device, causing it to go into thermal runaway, might not be categorized as a battery fire in MFIRS or NFIRS.
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