Chicago Mom Dies Of COVID-19 After Child Was Exposed To Virus In School

A 44-year-old woman in Chicago, Illinois, has died of COVID-19 after contracting the virus from her daughter, who was exposed to it at her elementary school, her family said.

Shenitha Curry died of COVID-19 last Thursday, and her family believes she caught the virus from her fifth-grade student daughter, who is attending Jensen Elementary School (JES) in Lawndale, ABC 7 Chicago reported. Curry was not vaccinated.

Curry's sister, Jasyma Johnson, pinned the blame on Chicago Public Schools (CPS) — the school district JES is part of.

"If my sister had to live three blocks west of where we are standing right now, and crossed over into Oak Park, it would be different," said Johnson. "Because they have different safety protocols, different safety measures in place."

Curry had strictly followed pandemic mitigation protocols and only left her home when necessary, her sister said, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. Additionally, Curry always wore a mask, cleaned her hands and disinfected surfaces.

She had wanted her kids to learn remotely this fall, her sister claimed.

“She was just really upset that she had to send her children to school because she felt like she knew she was going to be the one who got sick. And here it is. She got sick, and she didn’t beat it,” Johnson said.

JES, a school with 297 students, has had at least eight confirmed cases since the start of the school year. Around 205 of those students — including Curry's daughter — had been sent home over the past two weeks after they were identified as close contacts of the confirmed cases.

Curry's daughter was set to return to school this week after being directed to isolate, but she was now staying home following her mother's passing. Had she returned, she would have joined the eight classes out of 11 that were in quarantine for a two-week remote learning period.

While CPS maintains that none of JES' coronavirus cases are the result of in-school transmissions, some parents said they would rather keep their kids at home.

"I am more towards remote learning than them being back until this stuff is under control," said Lasundra Ward, a JES parent.

City officials are now investigating Curry's death, but Dr. Allison Arwady, commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH), said her staff had found no breaks in protocol at the elementary school, according to a more recent report by the Chicago Sun-Times.

"We do not have evidence of any large-scale outbreak at this school," Arwady told reporters at a press conference Tuesday.

The CDPH commissioner continued, "There are a lot of statements being made that we have not been able to verify at this time. I would ask, please, as members of the media, to not be reporting things that are not proven facts. Because I think we’re seeing a lot of misinformation, frankly."

Arwady also acknowledged the worries surrounding the situation at JES and asked for "caution" as the city finishes its investigation. A formal report will be released alongside the CDPH's findings, she added.

The U.S. has reported more than 43.2 million COVID-19 cases and around 693,000 deaths as of Wednesday, according to data from The New York Times.