AP
9/28/21
A federal judge has extended a restraining order for 14 days that prohibits Iowa officials from enforcing a law that bans school districts from enacting mask mandates.
The order issued by Judge Robert Pratt Monday extends the order until Oct. 11 which means school districts may impose mask mandates and the state cannot stop them.
Information filed Monday in a lawsuit challenging the law indicates nearly a quarter of Iowa public school students are in districts that have experienced significant COVID-19 outbreaks this year. It indicates 11 school districts, including Waterloo and Muscatine, have reported more positive cases in the first month of the school year than during the entire previous year. 16 other school districts, including Cedar Rapids and Des Moines, have already recorded coronavirus cases amounting to at least 50 percent of the tally for the last school year.
The court document cited local and state data and school information collected by Iowa COVID-19 Tracker, an online service that compiles data from government sources including school districts.
Efforts to track outbreaks in schools have been hampered by policies implemented by Gov. Kim Reynolds in July that discontinued daily reporting of virus activity. In addition, Iowa is no longer providing widespread testing, leaving families to find their own tests if a child is exposed or symptomatic.
Reynolds has said she is adopting a policy in which the state treats COVID-19 like the flu, which means state officials have stopped investigating cases and contact tracing in schools. Reynolds rejected more than $95 million in federal pandemic relief offered to Iowa to fund testing, contact tracing and other mitigation measures. She said the state didn’t need the money.
In a response to questions about her statements questioning the effectiveness of masks in schools, Reynolds’ spokesman Alex Murphy said masks should be a parental choice, and he repeated discredited information that masks cause social, behavioral and speech development problems.
At least 24 school districts have reinstated a mask mandate since Judge Pratt issued a temporary restraining order on Sept. 13 preventing the state from enforcing the ban on school districts mandating masks.