New Lice Guidelines Set by APA

Despite all common practices and beliefs, a new group of researchers have come out to say children with lice are fine to go to school.

New guidelines have been put out by the American Pediatrics Association state that although the lice cause severe itching, they are only contagious by head to head contact which is hard to do. The new guidelines say, “no healthy child should be excluded from school or allowed to miss school time because of head lice or nits.”

The usual rule of thumb has been that students must be free of lice and nits, the eggs, before returning to school as not to infect other children.

Personally, as someone who had lice in my elementary school years, I do not think these new guidelines should be put in place. Lice are an awful parasite, although they don’t typically carry disease, are one of the most annoying things ever.

In gym class students often share clothes or hair products among other things. Lice could very easily be transferred over in a locker room. I can only imagine a classroom full of children who played together all having lice.

While the APA may think they are doing children a favor by allowing them to attend school, I don’t think it will actually help anyone.