The president parried criticism of his push to reopen schools in August and September, saying he's "100 percent" in support of the move because children "have very strong immune systems."
“A lot of people are saying they don’t transmit. They don’t bring it home with them," Trump added. "If they do catch it, they get better very fast."
Trump told one reporter at the White House press conference that he was "comfortable" with his son, Barron, as well as his grandchildren, returning to school in the coming months.
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos announced last week that US public school systems would reopen as normal for the coming school year, threatening to slash federal funding for districts that refuse to do so. A subsequent survey by Politico and Morning Consult showed that 53% of Americans surveyed were against the idea.
One study from April posted by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) noted that "relatively few children with COVID-19 are hospitalized, and fewer children than adults experience fever, cough, or shortness of breath." However, it did not report a lower infection rate.
Another study, published in The Lancet last month, noted little evidence of COVID-19 infections in children between the ages of 5 and 9, but found that children above the age of 9 showed the exact same infection rate as adults.
