Dr. Oz says he 'misspoke' when he said reopening schools may be 'worth the trade-off' despite potentially causing more coronavirus deaths

• Celebrity health commentator Dr. Mehmet Oz has said he "misspoke" after suggesting on a recent Fox News segment that might be "worth the trade-off" to re-open schools despite potentially increasing the coronavirus death toll.
• Oz told viewers a recent paper in the medical journal The Lancet showed re-opening schools would "only" increase total deaths from the pandemic by 2-4%.
• The study in The Lancet was an April 8 review that found closing schools would "only" prevent a couple of thousand deaths (and, based on the 67,594 global deaths recorded at the time, that amounted to 2-4%).
• Following a massive backlash to his comments on social meeting, Oz responded on Friday that said he realized he "confused and upset people."
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Dr. Mehmet Oz, a heart surgeon and celebrity medical advisor made famous by Oprah Winfrey, recently drew criticism after a Fox News segment in which he said re-opening the schools is "a very appetizing opportunity" because it "may only cost us 2-3% in terms of total mortality."

"That's a tradeoff some folks would consider," Oz said in a clip widely shared on social media.

His comments were met with outrage at the notion that risking any number of lives is worth reopening schools.

It comes in the midst of ongoing debates over when it might be safe for things to return to normal, with public health officials, generally, urging politicians not to open up too soon.

On Thursday evening, Oz walked back the comments in a statement on Twitter, saying that he "misspoke" and didn't intend to upset anyone.

There was a lot of confusion about what statistics Oz was citing

Oz is no stranger to peddling questionable advice about coronavirus, though there is more nuance to the data he was describing than he let on in the Fox News clip.

Much of the backlash stems from the statistic Oz referenced, which comes from an editorial published April 8 in the Lancet, which presents research that closing schools may have limited more benefits in slowing the spread of the virus than some may have expected.

The editorial states that "school closures alone will reduce COVID-19 deaths by only 2–4%," based on a model from UK researchers at Imperial College London.

Many of Oz's viewers interpreted that to mean 2-4% of all schoolchildren in the US, which, given the American school population, would translate to 1.1 to 1.7 million deaths.

The article was actually saying that based on the UK model, school closures could be estimated to curb the current number of fatalities from rising another 2-4%. For the 67,594 global deaths at the time, a 2-4% increase would amount to an additional 1,350 to 2,700 deaths.

That's a very different proposition to millions of deaths, Newsweek columnist Seth Abramson noted on Twitter, but still far from "appetizing," as Oz referred to it.

Science writer Yvette d'Entremont wrote that it was still an "unacceptably high mortality rate" and "f*cked up" to suggest it might be a worthwhile trade.

Writer Joshua Potash, after correcting his initial impression of the statement, also commented on Twitter that any amount of additional deaths would be too many.

"There should be no debate. We don't need to sacrifice a single kid," he said.

The Lancet study warned school closures could put vulnerable children at risk of losing meals and health services

School closures are complicated.

The Lancet article focused on the services that children may be missing with schools closed, including meals, mental health services, medical check-ups or vaccines, clean water and hygiene facilities, and more. In particularly, low-income youth may be most vulnerable to the side effects of schools staying closed.

Its authors urge public health officials to consider how best to continue offering these services, and additional assistance (including mental health support for grieving families) during and after the outbreak.

"It is imperative that we validate the experiences of the young during this global crisis, that we listen to their creative solutions for coping and connecting, and that we empower them to utilize their new skills to create a more robust, caring, and connected society as we emerge into the changed world," The Lancet article concludes.

Read more:

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A mom who relies on federal benefits can't get her groceries online, even though she had a fever and a cough: 'I'm confused, concerned, scared to death'

Everything we know about masks and the coronavirus, from who should wear them to how to make one

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