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Garden State Times

Tuesday, January 28, 2025

New York school district ask students to carry clear plastic bags instead of backpacks as precaution to prevent COVID-19 spread

Backpacks

A school in New York has asked students to carry their belongings in clear plastic bags instead of bringing in traditional book bags in an effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19. | Flickr

A school in New York has asked students to carry their belongings in clear plastic bags instead of bringing in traditional book bags in an effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19. | Flickr

As New Jersey schools prepare to open this fall, a school in New York could be a good role model on how to keep students safe during the COVID-19 pandemic.

New York's Greater Amsterdam School District will have many requirements that are now almost standard preventing the spread of COVID-19, including masks, hand-washing and social distancing.

But Greater Amsterdam is also going further than some school systems. For example, all lunches will be pre-packaged to prevent students from standing close together in cafeteria lines, the Leader-Herald reported.

Also, lockers will not be used and schools are asking students to carry clear plastic bags instead of backpacks or gym bags.

“We’re really asking parents to reduce the amount of materials they send their students with as everything can have parts of COVID that could be sticking to certain materials worse than others,” Greater Amsterdam Superintendent Richard Ruberti told the Leader-Herald.

There has been growing concern nationally over whether reusable cloth grocery bags are healthy and some governments have actually banned them during the coronavirus pandemic, according to media reports.

A 2010 study by the University of Arizona found that consumers were “almost completely unaware of the need to regularly wash their bags,” the university said in a news release.

“Our findings suggest a serious threat to public health, especially from coliform bacteria including E. coli, which were detected in half of the bags sampled," one of the study’s coauthors, Charles Gerba, said in the news release.

The university recommended that states mandate printed instructions on reusable bags to clean or bleach them, the news release said.

The coronavirus has prompted some states to delay enacting bans on plastic bags, USA Today reported. In Maine, a ban had been scheduled to begin on April 22 but Gov. Janet Mills delayed it until Jan. 15, 2021, the story said.

The San Francisco the Department of Public Health stopped businesses from allowing customers to bring their owns bags from home, USA Today reported.

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker took similar action.

"From now on, reusable bags are prohibited and all regulations on plastic bag bans will be lifted," Baker said, WBUR reported.

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