I am with @Trebuchet on this one. China has been able to stamp this out so why are assuming that schools can’t resume come September? I would absolutely be willing to sign a waiver and allow my kiddo to go to boarding school in September. We can start slowly with parents who are more than happy to send their young healthy kids to school and see what happens. While, yes there are some young people who die, the rate for them is actually less than the risk of fatality for skiing, especially if they have no pre-existing conditions in which case it’s actually around the rate of the seasonal flu. It’s tragic but some young people every year die from flu too. We still send our kids to school during flu season though and we don’t close down ski resorts because there’s a risk of death.
There’s actually a renowned epidemiologist who has modeled and studied outbreaks for 35 years who actually says that the best way for us to deal with covid is to open up the schools and let the disease run its course. Children are the best protection as nature has made them really resistant to complications from respiratory infections like COVID. The old and sick would need to stay home for about four weeks but then in four weeks we would get past this. Social distancing, masks etc. would be a thing of the past in very short order. And for people who worry about hospitals being overrun, that wouldn’t happen as it’s the old that are causing this burden on our current system. Even if everyone under 50 who is healthy went out tomorrow, there would not be enough cases to overwhelm it. Eventually when enough people get the infection and have immunity from it, the old can go out and feel safe. I can’t provide the link here but you can look for perspectives on the pandemic #2.
I also wonder why people seem to think that schools would only be closed in the fall? If we are worried about a second wave, wouldn’t this wave be more likely to occur when COVID itself seems active which is probably during the normal flu season ie. November to May? Also what about schools not being open for interviews, tours etc for perspective students? How would that hurt their bottom line? It would be a real shame to not have schools open in the fall and I really don’t see the need for it. Universities should be open too. However, note that I do NOT think all the kids/faculty should be on these campuses. Any that have pre-existing conditions or people who are likely to interact with others who may be old, sick or frail should stick to online learning only until there are enough people who have developed immunity. It’s probably a four week delay for them though rather than possibly 2 years or more for a vaccine - also not sure why there seems to be an assumption that an effective vaccine is inevitable. It might happen but we still don’t have a vaccine for the common cold.