CLEVELAND — Editor's note: The video in the player above is from a previously published, unrelated story.
Just one week after Cleveland Metropolitan School District (CMSD) officials held a State of the Schools address, the district released a statement confirming the deaths of two staff members.
According to the district, the two members of the "supports staff" worked at Andrew J. Rickhoff School and Nathan Hale School.
District officials released the following statement to 3News late Thursday evening:
"The District has no word on the official causes of death and is restricted in providing other health information. We can say that we found no record of Ms. Coleman’s COVID-19 case being reported to our District COVID-19 hotline.
We continue to assure the public that CMSD has strict COVID-19 protocols in place.
CMSD nurses, with training by the Cleveland Department of Public Health, conduct contact tracing for cases that are reported to the hotline.
We require that all students, staff and visitors wear masks while in our buildings. Other safeguards include social distancing, temperature checks, frequent sanitization and random, voluntary testing for the virus."
Last week, CMSD CEO Eric Gordon said that the district has had roughly 400 confirmed COVID-19 cases since the beginning of the school year, however, only one case happened at the school.
"COVID is getting worse and COVID is impacting kids," Gordon said during a Q&A portion of the address. "We have a kindergarten student who is hospitalized right now. We have high school students who are hospitalized right now. And we have staff members who are hospitalized."
The CEO also said that the district is prepared to go back into remote learning if need be.
"If we have to, we will," Gordon said. "But our teachers want to be in class with you (students)."
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Editor's note: The video in the player above is from a previously published, related story.