MWSU Immunologist

Dr. Grantham, a MWSU professor speaks about COVID-19, four months after we first discussed the pandemic.

90's.

So it will stay warm but at least we have chances for some rain.

Jodie.

>> you may remember earlier this week we spoke to professor at missouri western state about the new novel virus.

At that time, grantham was just starting to read about the virus.

We're interested to check his brain about his welcome back.

>> thank you.

>> we talked about kids and the way they were responding.

I thought that's a mystery.

What do you think about that now looking back four months into this?

>> i think it's still a bit of a mystery why children don't see severe disease.

It's certainly clear that kids don't get as much severe as everyone else.

There are certain other sort of syndromes associated with kids and circumstances that's multisystem that children can get.

It's a rare thing that happens in kids.

We don't know how well kids transmit to other kids.

That's something sort of on going.

There's at least some evidence that kids get infected but they don't transmit quite as well as adults but it's not zero.

>> are we in trouble because we haven't continued to quarantine or because we didn't get shut down?

>> i think there's certainly the possibility of that.

Right.

That cases will turn and go and we start seeing higher mortality rates.

More deaths.

Deaths have stayed low but they may not necessarily stay low.

There's this idea this may lag behind total number of cases and so, deaths will go up later.

And so i mean, for me, you have to look at what the overall goal was.

The goal was to flatten the curve and keep hospital situations where they are not being over run and not having to deal with huge number of cases at once.

And in some places, it seems like we're managing that.

Some places we're not.

So, it doesn't seem to me like it needs to be a country wide thing and we can sort of handle this on a lower more local level depending on what that area needs.

>> is it inevitable that we all will be exposed before a vaccine?

>> exposed probably.

Infected, probably not.

Right.

And so, it's not entirely clear you know, i don't know if it sort of depends on where you're at.

There was a study that came out recently about new york where they see probably around 20% infection rates in new york city.

And in a place like that, you're almost certainly going to have been exposed whether you are infectedor not.

Believe not everybody got infected.

Where you have lower infection rates, you will be less likely to be exposed and so i don't have a good answer for that.

>> how are you responding personally?

I mean for me, i just, i don't get into big crowds if i don't have to.

I don't go out unless i necessarily need to.

I am in a, not in a high risk group.

I'm not in a no risk group but i'm not in a high risk group.

I tend to go about the way i need to go about things and not worry an enormous amount about it.

But you know, i don't end up in big crowds.

I don't necessarily need to.

>> do you have any thoughts about school starting back up?

And in what maybe school districts should even think about how to separate kids and keep kids healthy and families?

It's a difficult thing to sort out.

Public schools are an important part of all of our lives, right.

And exactly how you keep, how much risk you take as far as you know keeping everybody separated and keeping ventilation is key.

Keeping ventilation rates up in schools and also stuff like that.

It's a really difficult thing to crack.

Not only for you know universities like we're at but also you know public schools as well.

It's a really good thing as far as the fact that kids don't seem to get severe disease.

But the concern is that you know we have lots of kids that have parents in high-risk groups or spend a lot of time with grandparents in high risk groups and we don't want a bunch of transmission going on in public schools and give that to those at risk for disease.

>> when you get your book written on covid-19, let us know and we will all buy it and have to read it and see if we can learn anything from our missouri western state university thank you doctor.

>> appreciate it.

>> we're going to take a quick