Alabama health officials say they can't verify student 'COVID party'

TUSCALOOSA, ALA. -- The Alabama Department of Public Health said it could not verify reports of so-called COVID-19 parties where students deliberately tried to become infected.

Tuscaloosa City Councilor Sonya McKinstry told news outlets recently that she heard of students holding parties and wagering over who would become infected.

• Newsletter sign-up: Get The COVID-19 Brief sent to your inbox

The department said it could not verify any parties where persons tried to contract COVID-19 but warned that it is a dangerous and sometimes deadly virus.

• 

  This 2020 electron microscope image made available by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows the spherical particles of the new coronavirus, colorized blue, from the first U.S. case of COVID-19. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-Hannah A. Bullock, Azaibi Tamin/CDC via AP)