After less than a week into the new school year, some districts are having to alter their COVID strategy. Students, and staff, at Richland High School, are now required to wear a mask in school settings for at least the next two weeks. This comes after more than 20 percent of students and staff at the high school were required to quarantine after coming in contact with an infected individual. In the Lebanon R-3 School District, 44 students and staff are currently quarantined, and double-digit cases have already been reported. Laclede County Health Department Administrator, Charla Baker, says she is not surprised the virus has spread quickly in a maskless environment……….

Baker says area school districts should be trying to utilize every layer of protection they can………..

Missouri Attorney General, Eric Schmitt, has vowed to sue any school district that institutes a mask mandate, even with cases spreading at an alarmingly high rate. Baker says the key to getting back to a pre-2020 life is for a majority of people to get vaccinated, which more than 70 percent of Laclede County residents have not done.