Mikel addresses high school closing on March 15, 2020.

Today, Missouri Governor Mike Parsons met with community leaders in Kirksville to discuss what is happening in the state with the COVID-19 outbreak.

Governor Parsons said that “personal responsibility is the key to this virus.”

With schools closed, students find themselves at home with an unexpected break. But the personal responsibility extends to even the youngest members of our community.

Students are asked to use social distancing while they are out of school to help to slow the spread of this disease.

Governor Parsons said “When you talk about young adults...some of this responsibility is on them… to make sure they don’t spread it [and] make sure they abide by the rules that we’re trying to set out there, whether that’s quarantine or not.”

Young people need to be aware that even though they may not be at major risk of the major effects of this disease, they can be carriers. Students can contract the disease, exhibit minor symptoms, and then unknowingly pass the disease along to other people.

The Governor wanted to remind students that “whatever groups that they’re in, and whoever they’re around they’ve got to remember that they’re going to be around their grandparents, they’re going to be around their parents…”

Kirksville Superintendent Robert Webb shared the same sentiment.

“The whole purpose of this [social distancing] is for the good of the community around them. Even though the students themselves are not as at risk for the negative effects of COVID-19. But it might be their parents and it would certainly be their grandparents who could be affected if the students happened to pick something up and then took it home to family.

According to the CDC, people over 60 years are considered “High Risk”. Also in the high risk group are people with lung disease, heart disease, and diabetes.

Students are helping to slow the spread of the disease and are protecting the high risk groups by protecting themselves and reducing their contact with other people.

There is also the educational concern. Governor Parsons said “it's fun to some of them that school is out for a little bit. But the reality of it is that education has got to go on.”

Students must remember that this is not a vacation. This is not spring break.

Mr. Webb warns that students could regress if they do not “attack learning with the same intention as they would before”.

He understands that it will not be the same as being with a classroom teacher. “There is no way they are going to get the same quality of instruction either in the online class or in the packets as they were going to get in the presence of a teacher.”

So it is really important for students to take this task seriously as well. It is, after all, their education.

Governor Parsons has a lot of faith in this generation. “I think this generation that is coming up is very articulate, they’re very smart, they’re very tech-savvy so if they want to learn they are going to learn every day.”

Also present was Dr. Randall Williams the Director of the Department of Health and Senior Services.

He had the following to say about symptoms of COVID-19 in comparison with the more familiar common cold and seasonal flu:

There are “three ways people present. With a cold you’ll have a runny nose, you’ll sneeze. That’s all upper respiratory. You don’t have that with COVID-19. The flu, it usually hits you like a ton of bricks. You’ll be walking along and all of a sudden have a fever of 102, you’ll feel terrible. That’s how the flu presents. With COVID-19 you have a dry cough and a fever. Almost 99% of people have a fever so it really distinguishes itself between its lower respiratory component and a cold or flu in that you’ll have a cough. You’ll have a fever. And your lungs will hurt. If you’re worried about any of them, call your [health care] provider before you go.”