America's Self-Inflicted 'Second Pandemic' Sends Families Into Hiding Again

50% of families chose virtual learning when schools started offering it again. Children stare at iPad screens instead of sitting in classrooms. Pregnant women skip doctor visits and consider home births. Entire families shelter in their homes, whispering that "nothing is safe."

It sounds like March 2020, when COVID-19 sent America into lockdown. But this is happening right now, as the country enters what feels like a second pandemic—one that's entirely self-inflicted.

The same essential workers who were on the pandemic's front lines are watching history repeat itself, except this time the wound comes from within.

When Fear Becomes Policy

In Los Angeles, car wash workers have been living in terror for nearly a year. Flor Melendrez, executive director of the CLEAN Carwash Worker Center, says over 100 car washes in the LA area have been raided by immigration authorities in recent months—some more than five times.

"You could only imagine the level of trauma," Melendrez told me. "It's like living a kidnapping scene."

Workers are keeping their children home from school, afraid of being stopped during pickup or dropoff. The fear isn't unfounded: Liam Ramos, a 5-year-old Minnesota preschooler, was taken into custody with his father while returning from school and spent almost two weeks in immigration detention in Texas.

Now school districts from Minneapolis to Charlotte are offering remote learning again—just like they did in 2020 and 2021. In St. Paul, Minnesota, 50% of families in some schools chose virtual learning when it became available in late January.

"It's impossible not to compare this to the pandemic," says Valora Unowsky, senior executive academic officer with St. Paul schools. But "during the pandemic, everybody was in the same situation." Now it's only the most vulnerable students—lower-income families, English language learners—who are back to learning on iPads instead of in classrooms.

The Medical Cost of Fear

At Children's Minnesota, pediatrician Dr. Bryan Fate describes an "eerie calm" in his waiting rooms as families skip their kids' checkups. When children do come in, they're sicker.

"We've certainly seen infections that fester and get worse at home," Fate says. Parents are "balancing the health of their child and the safety of their family, and that's a terrible decision they have to make."

Pregnant patients are skipping prenatal visits. More are requesting home births, even when it's medically unsafe. When families do come to hospitals for births, what should be joyous moments are now "tinged with fear," Fate explains. "This new life is going to need medical care that you're really terrified to have to go seek."

Children with disabilities and chronic conditions face the steepest costs. They depend on regular specialist appointments that families no longer feel safe keeping. "That can affect everything from breathing to getting feeds for your feeding tube, to getting a new wheelchair," Fate says. "Even just simply picking up medicine at the pharmacy is a risk for some families."

The Trauma We Already Know

Doctors, teachers, and others on the COVID front lines recognize these patterns. America is still healing from pandemic learning losses and psychological damage—only for a significant portion of the population to face them again.

Fate is already seeing anxiety symptoms in young patients: skin picking, hair pulling, bed-wetting. Among neurodivergent kids losing access to school-based therapies, he's witnessing "loss of these hard-earned milestones that are impacted by trauma."

"We learned from the pandemic how important it is to go to school, how important it is to have structure and routine and see faces and be with people," Fate reflects. "To see those similar themes emerge again, without a virus causing it, but the external act of the government—it's just a feeling of helplessness."

The one bright spot? Pandemic-era support networks are reactivating. Chicago's Nourishing Hope food pantry has expanded home delivery services for ICE-affected families. St. Paul schools are delivering food boxes to sheltering families, just like during COVID.

The Unequal Distribution of Pain

Earlier this month, White House Border Czar Tom Homan announced a drawdown of immigration forces in Minnesota. But advocates fear continued presence, and immigrant communities nationwide are still bracing, wondering if they'll be next—another echo of 2020, when Americans anxiously checked infection rates, waiting for the next surge.

Many families need "things that really nobody can provide," Unowsky says. "We're just looking forward to when we can bring our kids back."