9 Toronto schools to close until January due to COVID-19 outbreaks

The Toronto District School Board said Sunday that nine schools will be closed until the new year due to outbreaks of COVID-19.

The closures were implemented on the advice of Toronto Public Health (TPH) and will remain in place until Jan. 4, 2021, the board said.

Among the nine schools are Thorncliffe Park Public School and Fraser Mustard Early Learning Academy in East York. Both were were set to re-open Monday after they were closed earlier this month.

The figure also includes Marc Garneau Collegiate Institute, which was closed last week after 14 students tested positive for the illness. That number is now up to 18, according to the board.

The six other schools are:

• City Adult Learning Centre.
• Humewood Community School.
• R H McGregor Elementary School.
• David Lewis Public School.
• Grenoble Public School.
• Oakridge Junior Public School.

The schools will be closed to all students and staff, said Ryan Bird, spokesperson for the TDSB. There's no specific threshold for closures, he added.

"[TPH] looks at the individual circumstances around all the cases and then make that determination," he said. "Sometimes they don't have a lot of information about those cases. And that too, can be concerning. "

They examine factors like the timeline of cases, how infections are being transmitted and whether they are being transmitted in the community, he said.

Classes that are already self-isolating will continue to do so under advice from TPH and remaining classes will move to remote learning, said Bird.

He said the TDSB will continue to update school communities on the status of the schools.