NIH funds five additional projects to research safe means of returning to in-person school

As part of its Safe Return to School Diagnostic Testing Initiative, the National Institutes of Health funded five additional research projects last week to investigate ways of safely returning people to in-person learning in areas with vulnerable and underserved populations.

Up to $15 million will be awarded over two years to projects in California, Arizona, Hawaii, Nebraska, and Florida as part of this second installment of the initiative. Its first wave in April included eight awards totaling $33 million. These projects focus on implementing COVID-19 testing for students younger than 12 years old or ineligible for vaccination, explore the influence of vaccination on eligible students and staff, tackle vaccine hesitancy, and seek information on breakthrough infections.

“The new awards reaffirm NIH’s commitment to use evidence-based research to inform policymakers of the safest ways to return to schools in vulnerable and underserved communities,” Dr. Eliseo Pérez-Stable, director of NIH’s National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities and co-chair of the RADx-UP program, said.

Recognizing that many children lack equal access to COVID testing or remote learning, the program is NIH’s means of counteracting the valuable lessons, food, or other gains these students would otherwise miss. This specifically recognizes that such losses disproportionately affect minorities, socially and economically disadvantaged children, those with disabilities, and medical issues, among others.

“The in-person school environment and the wide range of services offered there are critical to the development of our nation’s young people,” said Dr. Diana Bianchi, director of NIH’s Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), which is managing the initiative. “By learning the best practices and methods through research, we can get children back in the classroom safely and equitably.”

Among the new projects are strategies for including preschoolers in return to school efforts as well as a focus on native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders — groups not included in previous awards. In all cases, researchers will work with state, tribal, and local officials to plan investigations.