Students at a $30,000-a-year private school in Miami will have to take a month off after receiving each dose of a COVID vaccine, as school officials fear they will infect unvaccinated students.
In a letter, the school’s Chief Operating Officer, Bianca Erickson informed parents of students at the Centner Academy: ‘Because of the potential impact on other students and our school community, vaccinated students will need to stay at home for 30 days post-vaccination for each dose and booster they receive.’
The students may return to school after the 30-day period, according to the letter, which was obtained by 7News, ‘as long as the student is healthy and symptom-free.’
But Erickson recommended parents instead ‘hold off until the summer,’ to receive a COVID vaccine because ‘there will be time for the potential transmission or shedding onto others to decrease.’
Erikson did not comment further on what exactly she feared vaccinated students could infect uninoculated students with, although the school’s co-founders have previously claimed that people with COVID vaccines can cause fertility issues if they come into contact with unvaccinated women.
The Centner Academy in Miami is making students who receive the COVID vaccine stay home for about a month after each dose
In a letter sent to parents, school officials said they were concerned about the affect of vaccinated students on non-vaccinated students
But there have been no reports of people who’ve had the shot passing on any kind of disease or illness to others as a result, save for ‘breakthrough’ COVID infections that unvaccinated students are at risk of anyway.
The Centers for Disease Control insists that all three COVID-19 vaccinations approved by the Food and Drug Administration are safe, as they do not use live viruses and could therefore not make anyone sick with COVID.
Children aged 12 and up are currently eligible to receive a COVID vaccine, with kids aged between five and 11 likely to be approved too in the coming weeks.
Vaccinating children has proven a controversial topic. Many parents who are pro-vax themselves say they’re unsure about having their children jabbed, because COVID is relatively harmless for the vast majority of kids who catch it.
Those who back vaccines for children say that even a small risk is unethical to take when it comes to the health of a child.
The Miami-based school, which teaches students from kindergarten through to senior year of high school, previously faced controversy back in April, when co-founder Leila Centner wrote to staff that vaccinated employees would no longer be allowed to work directly with students.
Teachers at the school were told they could either physically distance from students if they had had the shot; tell the school if they plan to get the vaccine ‘as we cannot allow recently vaccinated people to be near our students until more information is known’; or wait until the school year ends to get the vaccine.
In her letter, Leila wrote: ‘Reports have surfaced recently of non-vaccinated people being negatively impacted by interacting with people who have been vaccinated.
‘We cannot allow recently vaccinated people to be near our students until more information is known.
‘It is our policy, to the extent possible, not to employ anyone who has taken the experimental COVID-19 injection until further information is known.’
Leila, who set up the school with her husband David Centner in 2019, also said their decision had been made with ‘with a very heavy heart’. Staff were asked to fill out a form on their vaccine intentions, The New York Times reports.
She said those who receive the shot ‘may be transmitting something from their bodies’ and could harm ‘reproductive systems, fertility, and normal growth and development in women and children.’
Centner added: ‘Even among our own population, we have at least three women with menstrual cycles impacted after having spent time with a vaccinated person.’
Any teacher who opts to get the vaccine over the summer will not be allowed to return to the school, which has 300 students, until further clinical trials.’
The letter comes six months after school co-founder Leila Centner, left, told staff members they would not be allowed to work with children if they get the vaccine. She is pictured here with her husband and school co-founder, David Centner
Dr. Aileen Marty, an infectious disease expert at Florida International University blasted the school’s policy in an interview with 7News, saying there is no basis for it
The school shares a brief note on its vaccine policy on its website – with the detailed guidance proving extremely controversial, and infuriating professional medics
Following backlash from that decision, Joshua Hills, a parent and Centner Academy employee said at a news conference, ‘We’re not anti-vaxxers we’re in favor of safe vaccines. Are these vaccines, is this injection 100 percent safe?
‘As a parent of two children that go to this school, I’m not willing to take the chance on a question mark.’
Now, school officials are saying their concerns over what they call ‘experimental vaccines’ haven’t changed, as Erickson mentioned concerns over health issues in her letter and said the school respects everyone’s choice, but also need to watch out for the students’ safety.
In a statement to 7News, school officials said: ‘Centner Academy’s top priorities are our students’ well-being and their sense of safety within our educational environment.
‘We will continue to act in accordance with these priorities,’ it said. ‘The email that was sent to families today was grounded in these priorities.’
But Dr. Aileen Marty, an infectious disease expert at Florida International University said the school’s policy has no basis.
‘What happens 30 days after they get vaccinated?’ she asked. ‘What kind of nonsense is this?’
‘Where did they get that?’ she again asked, rhetorically, to 7News. ‘There’s nothing in the recommendations to that… they made that up.
‘That’s science fiction,’ Marty said, ‘not even science fiction because it’s pure fiction.’
‘I don’t find the letter interesting, I find it sad,’ she continued.
‘I find it terrible that there’s all this misleading information coming out of an institution that allegedly is an educational institution.
‘The technology is not new. The technology is well-established and it’s based on the best science we have.’
As of Sunday, about 66 percent of eligible Americans have received at least one dose of the COVID vaccine and 57 percent are fully vaccinated.
Meanwhile, the number of COVID cases has continued to decline, with 16,989 new cases reported on Sunday – down about 90 percent from a post-vaccine high of 184,196 on September 3.
And the number of deaths from COVID has also declined, with just 150 reported on Sunday, compared to 2,276 on September 14.