All over the nation schools are closing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which is growing at an exponential rate.. The Center for Disease Control recommends proactive school closures of two to four weeks for those with high absentee rates. For communities directly affected, four to eight weeks are recommended.

States like Ohio and Michigan have heeded the call, as has Seattle, located near the initial epicenter of the outbreak. Private schools and most colleges have closed in the wake of the outbreak in what some see as subtle classism. However in New York City, bordered to the north by the hard-hit Westchester County, public schools remain open as attendance rates dwindle. In WJPS, approximately a third of students were absent this Friday.

We need to be proactive before this situation gets worse than we can handle. Small children can carry the disease while remaining asymptomatic most of the time, spreading it to parents, grandparents, and staff.

New York is a big city, with a big transit system, with a big population that can spread the disease like it has in Wuhan and Milan. That such a dense city at such risk isn’t closing schools immediately doesn’t make sense at all.

A statistician and blogger, Tomas Pueyo, made a model of the Chinese province Hubei which holds that waiting one day of social distancing such as school closing can lead to an increase in cases of 40%. On a micro level, this can happen here if we don’t act now.

We need to close schools, and do so now. As we prepare, we must set up food programs in libraries, parks, pools, and community centers such as the YMCA. Along with this, other measures such as pausing evictions, guaranteeing paid leave to parents, and maintaining a support system of mental health professionals as we hit a peak.

With effective social distancing measures, we can decrease a peak, but we must act now.