When they eventually return to classrooms, thousands of North Carolina students - along with their teachers - will have access to rapid COVID-19 testing.
The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services has selected 17 school districts and 11 charter schools to receive more than 50,000 federally funded rapid antigen tests through its pilot testing program. Each school plans to offer classroom instruction for either some or all of its students this winter.
“This program gives us another tool in our tool kit to slow the spread of COVID-19 across our state and to keep children in the classroom, which we know is vital not only to their academic growth but also to their health and emotional development,” state health secretary Mandy Cohen said in a statement last week.