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Parents of Clay High School students protest school's mask mandate

All students and staff are required to wear masks indoors and in close outdoor settings.

OREGON, Ohio — Some 10 Oregon City School District Parents and community members gathered in front of Clay High School to protest the district's new mask mandate for students and staff.

On Aug. 18, OCS' superintendent Hal Gregory sent out an email to parents announcing the decision, citing increasing COVID-19 cases.

RELATED: School districts in 42 Ohio counties report rising COVID cases as misinformation, pushback over masks, vaccines linger

"I would like to see the school board go against the guidelines pushed out by the State of Ohio. I want them to have a backbone, to stand up and say 'no, we care more about the heath of your children,'" said Eric Rice, one of the protestors whose daughter goes to Clay. Rice believes masks violate his child's freedom and aren't the health concern that people claim it to be.

"This virus is very, very far down, below tuberculosis and the flu and things we don't hear anything about anymore- and things we didn't even wear masks for. And now suddenly this one is so bad and the numbers do not show it," Rice said.

RELATED: VERIFY | Setting the record straight on common COVID-19 myths

However, Toledo-Lucas County Health Commissioner Eric Zgodzinski cautions that you just have to look at what's happening in the United States currently to see that that isn't the case.

"We have significant individuals in the United States either having COVID, presenting in the hospital, in the ICU, on vents or worse than that, have died from it. So this is not, if you would, the common cold where you get a sniffle and everybody's fine afterwards," said Zgodzinski.

Despite these risk factors, the protestors say this event is only the beginning, and they will continue to be seen until action is taken or they take action of their own.

Some of the parents said that if they don't see the Oregon City school board change its policy soon, they might even remove their children from the school.

"I think many parents will remove their children from this environment. Personally, I would educate my daughter my at home with my other two young ones who are already home-schooled," Rice said.

Oregon City Schools say it will reevaluate the mandate on Sept. 24.

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