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US and World Politics

General Strike to Stop COVID-19

By Dr. Nayvin Gordon

The Federal Government issued advisory guidelines, August 18, 2020 adding teachers to the list of “essential workers.” These workers can be allowed to continue working and not quarantine after they have been exposed to COVID-19.1

These guidelines directly contradict the science of public health pandemic control and will further spread disease and death to students, staff, teachers and their families across the nation. Following an outbreak in Camden County Georgia in early August, Deputy Superintendent Jon Miller is reported to have sent a district-wide email to administrators, writing, “Staff who test positive are not to notify any other staff members, parents of their students or any other person/entity that they may have exposed them.” Furthermore, some states are already concealing the true number of COVID-19 infections.

All this is part of the systematic attack on science for the people. The recent passage of the Cares Act gave trillions of dollars to the rich corporations and Wall Street while pennies went to mass COVID-19 testing to protect the people.

July 2020 the White House Press Secretary said, “We will not let science stand in the way of opening schools.”2 Vice President Mike Pence also said, “we don’t want the guidance of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to be a reason schools don’t open.”

These murderous policies of deliberately accelerating the spread of the pandemic must be stopped. A strike of teachers, students and parents can be the spark that ignites a general strike for mass testing, tracing and isolation to end this epidemic. It is up to us. Only a mass movement of workers can force the government to meet the needs of the people.

Our lives depend on sharpening the class struggle.

—August 24, 2020


1 https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2020/08/21/trump-administration-declared-teachers-essential-workers-heres-what-that-means/

2 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2020/jul/16/coronavirus-us-covid-donald-trump-anthony-fauci-joe-biden-live-updates