WHYY
By
When Damaris Alvarado reopened her two South Philadelphia child care centers in May, she hustled to make them safe: instituting physical distancing and cleaning guidelines, staggering pickups and drop-offs to avoid bunching parents together, and spending tens of thousands of dollars on air purifying units.
For a while, the preventative measures seemed to work. The centers, which together enrolled 235 kids, had zero documented COVID-19 cases from May through October.
“Everything was going well,” Alvarado said, “prior to the second wave.”
On Nov. 17, Alvarado got the news she had been dreading: One of her staff members had tested positive for COVID. She said she immediately closed down that classroom and contacted families.