National Guard Is Called In to Help New Mexico Schools Stay Open

With the Omicron variant depleting school staffs as it sweeps across the country, some states are resorting to increasingly creative measures to find the substitute teachers needed to keep schools open, in one case even calling on the National Guard.

State workers can now serve as substitute teachers in some hard-hit districts, while other states are loosening rules to speed up the hiring of substitutes or draw retirees back into the classroom.

In New Mexico, where new cases have more than tripled over the past two weeks, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has asked the National Guard and state workers to fill in as substitute teachers.

“Our kids, our teachers and our parents deserve as much stability as we can provide during this time of uncertainty,” Governor Lujan Grisham said in a statement on Wednesday, “and the state stands ready to help keep kids in the classroom.”

Under New Mexico’s initiative, National Guard members and state workers must become licensed as substitute teachers or child care workers and fulfill the usual requirements for substitute teachers, such as background checks and a teaching workshop.

In recent weeks, about 60 school districts and charter schools in New Mexico have moved to remote learning, and 75 child care centers have partially or completely closed because of staffing shortages, state officials said.

Keeping schools open during the Omicron wave has become a fiercely debated issue nationally, especially among parents. President Biden was asked about school closings at a White House news conference on Wednesday, and he was quick to point out that most schools were open.

“Let’s put it in perspective: 95 percent, as high as 98 percent, of the schools in America are open, functioning and capable of doing the job,” Mr. Biden said, adding that he encouraged states and school districts to use funding to keep schools open.

According to Burbio, a data company that has tracked how schools are responding to the pandemic, for the past five schools days an average of 3,631 of the 98,000 public schools have been disrupted each day, a relatively low figure.

Whitney Holland, president of the American Federation of Teachers in New Mexico, said on Wednesday that the teacher staffing shortage was a “nationwide crisis.”

“I think ‘dire’ is an appropriate word,” Ms. Holland said, adding that she supported Governor Lujan Grisham’s initiative to keep schools open for students.

“As long as there’s a positive adult that they can build connections with — whether it’s a National Guard member or a state employee or a substitute — and we’re keeping our schools open, that’s our top priority,” she said.

In Oklahoma, Gov. Kevin Stitt issued an executive order on Tuesday which allows state agencies to let their workers serve as substitute teachers without affecting their regular job, pay or benefits.

“I’ve said from the beginning that our students deserve an in-person education and our schools need to stay open,” Governor Stitt said. “The state has a responsibility to do what we can to help make that happen.”

In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order last week that loosened rules for substitute teachers, citing the Omicron surge. Set to run through March, the order speeds up hiring for qualified short-term substitutes, lets current substitutes have their assignments extended, and makes it easier for retired teachers to return.

Teachers are not the only school employees in short supply. Last year in Massachusetts, Gov. Charlie Baker activated the National Guard to help with a shortage in bus drivers. And in North Carolina, legislators gave districts federal funding to cover signing bonuses to help ease a shortage of cafeteria workers.

An American Airlines flight to London from Miami turned around about an hour into its journey on Wednesday night because of a passenger who refused to follow coronavirus masking rules, the airline said.

Police officers met Flight AAL38 at Miami International Airport when it returned, but it was not immediately clear if they had detained or charged anyone. The Miami-Dade Police Department and Miami International Airport did not immediately respond to phone and email requests for comment early Thursday.

The Boeing 777, carrying 129 passengers and 14 crew members, was about 500 miles into its 4,400-mile flight when it reversed course off the coast of North Carolina, flight trackers show.

American Airlines said in a statement that the flight had been diverted because of “a disruptive customer refusing to comply with the federal mask requirement.”

The episode was another in a long list of midair mask disputes that have erupted during the pandemic.

In October, a passenger was accused of punching an American Airlines flight attendant in her nose, giving her a concussion, after a mask dispute. The airline’s chief executive called the violent encounter on the California-bound flight from New York “one of the worst displays of unruly behavior we’ve ever witnessed.”

In May, a California woman on a Southwest Airlines flight repeatedly punched a flight attendant, bloodying her face and chipping three teeth, after she was asked to buckle her seatbelt, put up her tray table and “wear her face mask properly.”

Thousands of other episodes involving unruly passengers have taken place in recent years, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. As of Tuesday, the agency said, it had received 151 reports of unruly passengers, 92 related to face masks, since Jan. 1. Last year, it received 5,981 reports of unruly passengers and 4,290 mask-related incidents.

When Zhao Xiaoqing first met Zhao Fei on a blind date, the sparks didn’t really fly.

When they met for a second time at his home in northwest China in December, it lasted longer than they both expected.

Facing a new outbreak of coronavirus cases, the health authorities announced a lockdown so sudden and severe that she didn’t have time to scurry home.

So for nearly four weeks, Zhao Xiaoqing has lived in the city of Xianyang, in Shaanxi Province, with the family of Zhao Fei, a man she had barely known. (They share a last name but are not related.)

“Initially, I was quite worried about things being awkward,” said Ms. Zhao, who is from Baoji, about 93 miles away, or a two-hour drive by car. “But I got along well with his family.”

Chinese officials have employed swift lockdowns across the country as one of its top strategies to rapidly stamp out infections. Last month, officials locked down 13 million people in the city of Xi’an, which borders Xianyang, for mass testing after an outbreak. The scale and the length of that lockdown led residents to complain about running out of food and their treatment by the authorities. A pregnant woman lost her baby after she had to wait for hours at a hospital because she was unable to prove she did not have Covid-19.

But at Mr. Zhao’s house, a romance was blossoming. Ms. Zhao spent her days working on her family’s business, promoting her father’s fresh apples on Douyin, China’s version of TikTok.

“Sometimes I lost track of time when working; he would remind me to take a break,” she said of her date.

His consideration impressed her.

Mr. Zhao, who runs his own e-commerce business selling hair products, sometimes cooked fried rice for her. She, in turn, encouraged him to take online lessons in his free time.

He said that because circumstances forced them to spend time together, they got to know each other better. “We were able to move forward in a speedy fashion,” he said.

When the authorities lifted the lockdown on Friday, Ms. Zhao was free to leave. Instead, she plans to stay until Lunar New Year, and that’s not the end of the story.

“Lots of friends were curious about whether the blind date was a success,” Ms. Zhao said beaming in a video on Douyin last week. “Of course, it was.”

She announced that they planned to get engaged in two weeks and hoped to marry in the summer. Her parents were supportive, she said.

As for Mr. Zhao, he said he had found true love.

“I’m quite happy,” he said. “We basically found each other by an accident of fate.”

New Zealand, one of the most highly vaccinated countries in the world, has cut off the only path for citizens and visa holders abroad to return in an effort to minimize the risk of an outbreak of the highly transmissible Omicron variant of the coronavirus.

The tightened border controls, announced on Wednesday, come almost two years after the country shut down almost all incoming traffic, except for a small number of exempted visa holders and returning citizens. Since October 2020, New Zealanders wishing to return home have had to compete for limited spots in hotel quarantine. Last year a lottery was introduced to manage the demand.

Booking of spots for March and April has been put on hold indefinitely, Chris Hipkins, the minister responsible for New Zealand’s pandemic response, said at a news conference on Wednesday.

“No decisions have been made on the date, sequence and conditions for the border reopening, and cabinet will consider options within the next couple of weeks based on the most up-to-date advice,” he said.

Residents who had already booked slots to return in January and February would still be able to enter, he added.

The decision highlights how the variant has changed the calculus even for countries with high rates of vaccination, like Australia, Britain and New Zealand.

New Zealand has fully inoculated more than 93 percent of people 12 and older, and it has not had a widespread outbreak of Omicron. The variant has been detected in a few people working either at Auckland Airport or in quarantine facilities. But those cases have prompted fears of community transmission.

On Thusday, in her first address of the year, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told New Zealanders to prepare for higher numbers of virus cases that “we haven’t experienced before.”

“Omicron is in every corner of the world at the moment,” she said. “We also know that there will be other variants.”

The country previously announced plans for a phased reopening in February. Ms. Ardern did not roll back those plans but laid out a strategy should a wave of Omicron cases emerge.

“When we have evidence of Omicron transmitting in the community, we won’t use lockdowns,” she said. “Instead, the whole country will move into ‘red,’” she added, referring to the highest level of restrictions in New Zealand’s “traffic light” alert level system.

Businesses will remain open, with limited capacity to serve unvaccinated customers and some restraints on how many people may gather. Masks will be compulsory, and there will be limits on public gatherings. Antigen and P.C.R. tests will be free. The country also hopes to distribute boosters and vaccinate children between ages 5 and 11.

“Not many countries have had a chance to roll out a booster before Omicron hits,” Ms. Ardern said. “We have, and we are. It’s an opportunity we need everyone to take up.”

In other global news:

• Hong Kong suspended in-person classes at secondary schools from Monday until Feb. 7, after the Lunar New Year holiday, which begin on Feb. 1, because of rising coronavirus cases in schools. The city’s Education Bureau had already suspended classes at primary schools and kindergartens. To boost the city’s vaccination rate, about 70 percent, children age 5 to 11 will be allowed to get doses of China’s Sinovac vaccine starting Friday, and the Pfizer-BioNTech shot as of Feb. 16.

• Thailand will restart its quarantine-free visa program for vaccinated tourists and other foreign visitors on Feb. 2, the government said on Thursday, after a decline in new cases. “Infections have increased but at a manageable rate and is now stabilizing with trends suggesting a decrease soon,” the authorities said. Under the so-called Test and Go program, travelers will have to take two P.C.R. tests: one on entry and another on the fifth day.

Nearly 800,000 new coronavirus cases are being reported in the United States each day, according to a New York Times database, most caused by the fast-spreading Omicron variant, and the true number is likely much higher.

Although many people are quickly recovering, the Omicron surge poses a particular risk to the unvaccinated and has put enormous strain on hospitals and health care workers.

But among the vaccinated and boosted, getting infected with the Omicron variant also appears to be contributing to a psychological shift, as people realize they have probably gained at least a short-term natural boost to their immune system.

Scientists call it “hybrid immunity,” which results from the combined protection of pre-existing vaccine antibodies and natural antibodies from a breakthrough infection. It can vary by individual and may wane over time, experts say.

Experts also caution against trying to get infected on purpose as a way to gain hybrid immunity. The virus is unpredictable, they say, and even young people can become very sick. In addition, it’s impossible to know who might develop long Covid after an infection.

Clues to how long the surge of the highly contagious Omicron might last are emerging from an unlikely source: sewage.

People who contract the coronavirus shed the virus in their stool, and the virus levels in local wastewater provide a strong, independent signal of how much is circulating in a given community.

The sewage data reveal an Omicron wave that is cresting at different times in different places.

According to Biobot Analytics, a company tracking the coronavirus in wastewater in 183 communities across 25 states, viral levels have already begun to decline in many big cities but are still rising in smaller communities.

In the Boston area, for instance, Biobot’s data suggests that the wastewater viral load has been falling since early January, consistent with other data suggesting that the virus may have peaked there. The virus appears to be waning in New York City wastewater, too, according to data shared by scientists in the region.

A variety of wastewater surveillance efforts in the United States show that viral loads have also started to decline in Denver; San Diego; Saint Paul, Minn.; and elsewhere.

Although there are lags between when wastewater samples are collected and when the results are publicly available, the most recent data suggest that the virus may not have peaked yet in parts of Ohio, Utah, Florida and wide swaths of rural Missouri.

“Wastewater surveillance is a really powerful tool, and we’re seeing really a good example of that with Omicron,” said Amy Kirby, the program lead for the National Wastewater Surveillance System, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention established in the fall of 2020. “It’s not just an early warning sign, but it’s also helpful to monitor the full trajectory of a surge.”