[Genuine Realist]

If all their kids have already got covid, no reason schools can't open.

*envision guy tapping head meme here*

You probably meant this rhetorically, but isn't  it, in its perverse way, good news?

That was my first thought, but keep in mind that there is selection bias going on here; children are presumably only being tested if they are symptomatic or close contacts of someone infected.  If there were a random sample of children in the state, then you might think that in the next two months you could get to herd immunity and safely open the schools.  Alas, I suspect the fraction of kids who are not tested who would be positive if they had been, is a lot lower than 30% so we are probably a ways away from herd immunity.

BC

I thought of that, too, but we're in thought experiment country. Assume that it is discovered that a brobdingnagian percentage of the non-geezer public has the virus, in weak or asymptomatic form. This seems to be good and bad news.

Of course, it does the geezer population (me) no good at all. In fact, i do believe we have to maintain even greater social distance, until we eventually die of boredom and thereby solve a pressing actuarial problem. But 'normal' social activities resume for the less vulnerable. Have I got this wrong?

BTW, don't mean to be political, but that would be pretty much the equation Boris Johnson sought for Great Britain way back when.

[Genuine Realist]

If all their kids have already got covid, no reason schools can't open.

*envision guy tapping head meme here*

You probably meant this rhetorically, but isn't  it, in its perverse way, good news?

That was my first thought, but keep in mind that there is selection bias going on here; children are presumably only being tested if they are symptomatic or close contacts of someone infected.  If there were a random sample of children in the state, then you might think that in the next two months you could get to herd immunity and safely open the schools.  Alas, I suspect the fraction of kids who are not tested who would be positive if they had been, is a lot lower than 30% so we are probably a ways away from herd immunity.

BC

I thought of that, too, but we're in thought experiment country. Assume that it is discovered that a brobdingnagian percentage of the non-geezer public has the virus, in weak or asymptomatic form. This seems to be good and bad news.

Of course, it does the geezer population (me) no good at all. In fact, i do believe we have to maintain even greater social distance, until we eventually die of boredom and thereby solve a pressing actuarial problem. But 'normal' social activities resume for the less vulnerable. Have I got this wrong?

BTW, don't mean to be political, but that would be pretty much the equation Boris Johnson sought for Great Britain way back when.