By Jordyn Forte
With the weather changing, runny noses, sneezing, sore throats, and the sniffles are all going around campus; but, what’s the cause – allergies, colds, the flu, or COVID-19?
This semester, Stonehill has taken a number of precautionary measures to maintain the health of students and staff, including the requirement of masks in classrooms and public settings, weekly asymptomatic COVID-19 testing, contact tracing, and socially-distanced classrooms whenever possible.
But many Stonehill students have still fallen ill in the past couple of weeks.
Sophomore Isabelle Pioli is one of many who have already gotten sick this semester.
Many of Pioli’s professors were prepared for such circumstances, though, and they allowed her to Zoom into class; others graciously excused her from class, she said.
“I think Stonehill is doing a great job of keeping us healthy by having us continue to test and by keeping particular regulations so that it is much less likely that the virus could be passed around unknowingly,” Pioli said. “While I’m a bit worried, overall I feel calm because I know we have our masks to prevent even normal sicknesses, we are able to get tested every week, and, even if we are sick, we will easily be able to quarantine ourselves.”
Though she has remained healthy this semester, senior Emma MacIntyre recently noticed the rise in allergy and common cold symptoms on campus, as well as the change in people’s response to them.
“It is good to take precautions and be aware of your symptoms, but it is also confusing to know if and when you are sick and should stay back and away from classes; this is a hard line to balance,” MacIntyre said. “As numbers can quickly change if symptoms are dismissed as colds, it is also debilitating to wonder if every sniffle is a cold.”
So far, the careful measures taken by Stonehill appear to be effective, and recent test result data suggests that many of the sniffles currently traveling around campus have, in fact, simply been allergies, colds, or other ailments, and not COVID-19.
According to an email from the Provost, the College’s COVID-19 positivity rate for the week of September 27 to October 1 was .03 percent, which was significantly lower than that of Bristol and Plymouth counties, where positivity rates for the week were 3.83 percent and three percent respectively.
Most recently, according to another email from the Provost, the College’s COVID-19 positivity rate for the week of October 11 to October 15 was .13 percent. Despite the recent increase in the College’s COVID-19 positivity rate, the College’s numbers are still significantly lower than that of other communities, such as the surrounding Bristol and Plymouth counties as well as Orange County, Florida, where COVID-19 positivity rates are noticeably higher – 3.71 percent, 3.12 percent, and 4.9 percent respectively.
Provost DeBrenna Agbényiga credits the unity of Stonehill College students and staff as a key factor in the College’s success in handling the Coronavirus thus far in the Fall 2021.
“We have come together as a community to protect, support, honor and really help each other to not only understand this time, but to adjust to and to manage the complexities of living through a pandemic for more than a year-and-a-half,” Agbényiga said. “I encourage my students and colleagues to continue to do everything that they’re doing – they’re doing the right thing; it is because of what they’re doing that we’re able to be the best Stonehill that we can be.”
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