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Preventing & Managing Communicable (Infectious) Diseases

Emergency Preparedness

Injury Prevention

Stay Connected to Austin Public Health

Preventing & Managing Communicable (Infectious) Diseases

** If your school has a child care program, you can find guidance for preventing and managing communicable diseases in the child care setting on the APH Child Care Providers page.**

For resources and to learn more about key prevention and management strategies recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the strategies required by the State of Texas, please select the topics below:

Vaccination

State of Texas minimum immunization requirements 

  • Keep required immunizations records and exemptions for students enrolled. More information about the minimum immunization requirements for schools can be found on the Department of State Health Services website.  

Recommended immunization schedules 

Vaccination opportunities 

  • Let staff and families know where they can get vaccinated.  
    • Austin Public Health offers immunizations, including COVID-19 and flu vaccines, to children who are uninsured or Medicaid recipients. Services are also available to uninsured adults. Find out more about appointments and Shot for Tots/Big Shots clinics on the APH Immunizations page. 
    • Partner with APH to host a vaccine event at your school for staff and families. Complete this questionnaire to request to host a pop-up vaccination clinic. 
State of Texas reporting requirements

The Texas Administrative Code requires that pre-K-12th grade schools report some cases or outbreaks of some communicable/infectious diseases among students and staff to their local health department.  

Reporting requirements are found in the Texas Notifiable Conditions List and the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) Communicable Disease Chart for Schools and Child Care Programs. 

How to report to Austin Public Health: 

Handwashing & respiratory etiquette

Teach students and staff when and how to wash their hands.

Use printable posters to help raise awareness about handwashing.

Teach children and staff how to cover coughs and sneezes.

Cleaning, sanitizing & disinfecting

Cleaning, sanitizing, and disinfecting surfaces are important everyday strategies to prevent the spread of infectious diseases. The CDC recommends that schools clean surfaces at least once a day. Learn more from the CDC about when and how to clean and disinfect a facility here.

Ventilation

Improving ventilation in buildings can help reduce the spread of COVID-19 and other communicable diseases by reducing the number of virus particles in the air. Learn more from the CDC about how to improve ventilation in schools here.

COVID-19 Operational Guidance & Resources

Preventing illness

Austin Public Health (APH) encourages pre-K-12th grade schools to follow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Operational Guidance for K-12 Schools and Early Care and Education Programs to Support Safe In-Person Learning.

According to the CDC, K-12 schools should:

“Put in place a core set of infectious disease prevention strategies as part of their normal operations. The addition and layering of COVID-19-specific prevention strategies should be tied to the COVID-19 hospital admission levels and community or setting-specific context, such as availability of resources, health status of students, and age of population served. Enhanced prevention strategies also may be necessary in response to an outbreak of COVID-19 in the K-12 setting.”

For summaries of some of the key COVID-19 specific prevention strategies found in the full CDC operational guidance and for additional resources, please select the topics below:

COVID-19 vaccination

Encourage staff and families to stay up to date with COVID-19 vaccination.  

Let staff and families know where they can get vaccinated. Find location by: 

To help promote vaccination, share these CDC web pages with staff and families: 

Help raise awareness about vaccination by using social media graphics, posters, videos, and customizable parent letters available from the CDC and APH: 

Partner with APH to host a vaccine event at your school for staff and families.  

  • To host a vaccine information session, complete this questionnaire. APH health educators will provide information about the safety, efficacy, and benefits of COVID-19 vaccines and answer questions. 
  • To host a pop-up vaccination clinic, complete this questionnaire. 
Masks

Wearing a face mask over your nose and mouth can help protect you and others from COVID-19. The CDC has information on who should wear a mask, when, and how to get the best fit, here.  

Keep in mind that certain groups of people should not wear a mask, including: 

  • Children younger than 2 years old. 
  • A person with a disability who cannot wear a mask, or cannot safely wear a mask, because of the disability as defined by the American with Disabilities Act (42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq.). 
  • Children who are sleeping. 
  • Anyone participating in activities where the mask could get wet, like swimming or water play. 

When someone has COVID-19

To learn more about the key COVID-19 mitigation strategies found in the full CDC operational guidance and about the State of Texas COVID-19 mitigation requirements, please select the topics below:

State of Texas isolation requirements and CDC recommendations for people who have tested positive or have COVID-19 symptoms

Pre-K-12th grade schools must exclude students who have COVID-19. Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) Communicable Disease Chart for Schools and Child Care Programs describes the symptoms, exclusion, readmission criteria, and more for COVID-19.

CDC’s Isolation and Precautions for People with COVID-19

Precautions for people who have been exposed

CDC’s What to Do If You Were Exposed to COVID-19 

Keep in mind that some people may not be able to follow the exposure guidance to wear a face mask around others (e.g., children under age 2). In those situations, other prevention strategies may include: 

  • Having anyone able to mask in the classroom wear a mask (teachers, children ages 2 and up, etc.). 
  • Increasing outdoor time. 
  • Improving ventilation in the classroom. 
  • Adding some physical distance during naps, meals, and snacks. 
State of Texas COVID-19 reporting requirements

The Texas Administrative Code requires that pre-K-12th grade schools report cases of COVID-19 to their local health department. APH has created an online COVID-19 reporting form for schools. If your school system is not connected to the online form, please email COVIDPreK-12FormHelp@austintexas.gov to give APH the name, email, and phone number of the person who will be responsible for reporting cases.

APH will reach out to those individuals to connect them with the online form. Reporting requirements are found in the Texas Notifiable Conditions List and the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) Communicable Disease Chart for Schools and Child Care Programs.

Notifications to the school community

Per the CDC, in the school setting, people exposed to someone with COVID-19 are advised to follow recommendations to wear a well-fitting mask and get tested. For this reason, APH strongly recommends that schools let staff and families know if they or their child have been exposed to a person with confirmed COVID-19. 

APH recommends that schools include information on the following topics in notifications to families and staff:  

  • Any relevant program policies. 
  • Latest recommendations for people exposed. 
  • Latest recommendations on isolation and treatment.
  • Testing options in the community.
  • Vaccine options in the community.
Testing

Finding a testing location:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) testing recommendations for different situations can be found on the COVID-19 Testing: What You Need to Know page.

  • Anyone with COVID-19 symptoms should test immediately.
  • If you don’t have symptoms but have been exposed to COVID-19, follow the CDC recommendations here.
  • PCR tests are the “gold standard” for COVID-19 tests. This means they are the most accurate and reliable kind of test. If you receive a negative COVID-19 test result from one PCR test, you can be confident that you probably do not have COVID-19.
  • Positive test results from a rapid antigen test are very accurate and reliable. However, in general, antigen tests are less likely to detect the virus than PCR tests, especially when symptoms are not present. Unlike PCR tests, you would need multiple negative rapid antigen test results to be confident that you do not have COVID-19.

Flu (Influenza) Resources

Coming soon.

 

RSV Resources

Coming soon.

 

Emergency Preparedness

Coming soon.

 

Injury Prevention

Coming soon.

 

Stay Connected to Austin Public Health

Email APHSchoolInfo@austintexas.gov to ask questions regarding communicable diseases or other public health topics. (Note: Please do not report disease cases via email.)

Email COVIDPreK-12FormHelp@austintexas.gov if you have questions about reporting COVID-19 cases to APH.

Call 512-972-5555  to contact the Epidemiology and Disease Surveillance Unit regarding communicable diseases. (Note: Instructions for reporting communicable diseases are in the "Preventing & Managing Communicable Diseases" section at the top of this web page.)

Want to be added to the APH Schools and/or the Youth & Summer Camp Email List(s)? APH sends occasional emails with public health updates and resources to schools and youth camp programs. Fill out this form to get added to the email list(s).