I’ll definitely run your article by my wife (Biology PhD), who’s better situated than I am to comment on the science than I am.
We have two kids and use the university’s daycare. It certainly feels like it’s the case that we get sick much more often as a result of daycare usage. So far, we’ve decided to eat this cost for a number of reasons (many of which will not apply broadly):
Our daycare is extraordinarily convenient. We hold hands and cross the street. There it is.
We love the teachers, the free play, the outdoor space, and the overall teaching philosophy.
Our daycare is slightly subsidized relative to other Palo Alto daycares.
Vetting a daycare felt easier than vetting nannies (more parents to talk to; generally a longer history of care). Also, more seems to ride on the choice of nanny in the sense that one person will have a lot more influence on the kids than a team of teachers (though arguably this unlocks more benefits if you are able to find an incredible nanny).
We have learned to cope with illness. Nothing will take away all the terribleness, but we’re pretty proactive with ibuprofen, Tylenol, and anti-nausea medication. We’ve also learned that if we do saline rinses as soon as either kid has a stuffy nose, it seems to greatly reduce the number of ear infections they have.
I have a flexible job that lets me work from home and request back-up care on short notice. I’m mostly able to absorb the sick days in this way.
My wife would have a more nuanced view of the studies you cite. I do have this general impression that lots of parents are over-stressed as a feature of our mega-society, high-information exchange modern environment. Like, today, as parents, we are confronted with the kind of stories and data you only get if you are part of million-member+ society. It’s easy to feel haunted by all kinds of terrible stories and outcomes where, in reality, many of them are on par with other risk I’ve internalized (e.g., car accident risk on the way to the grocery store) (which is not to say we shouldn’t take car accident risks seriously).
This would seem to differ from our ancestral environment, where the data and folk traditions from maybe ~10,000 persons pointed more directly to high risk and high impact harms. “Do not eat that specific mushroom” or “Warn the kids about the river and supervise trips near the river more closely.”
I think our brains have trouble processing rare but high impact risks communicated out of our mega-societies, in part, because there are many, many, many more we have to track now. Don’t get me wrong—I am grateful that our mega-societies are helping us understand and mitigate child suffering. But I also think our poor ability to process all these risks may itself lead to actions which carry future risks on par with the risks we were supposed to be mitigating. It does not seem implausible to me that high parental stress or overbearing supervision may have serious downstream consequences on child welfare.
All of this is to say that, assuming daycare has significant convenience/happiness benefits and the studies show marginal risks (perhaps on par with other risks you have deemed appropriate), it can be okay to say, “I know we will be sick more, but this is still good for us.”
I hope I won’t be cooked here too much for my phrase “deem appropriate.” I’m not saying that in the sense that I’ve become indifferent to certain risks and harms (or worse, embraced them in the “sour grapes” way). It’s just to say that certain risks seem very difficult to avoid (e.g., transporting my child) and worrying about them past a certain point would seem detrimental to my mental health and my overall ability to function and flourish in this risky world of ours.
I’ll definitely run your article by my wife (Biology PhD), who’s better situated than I am to comment on the science than I am.
We have two kids and use the university’s daycare. It certainly feels like it’s the case that we get sick much more often as a result of daycare usage. So far, we’ve decided to eat this cost for a number of reasons (many of which will not apply broadly):
Our daycare is extraordinarily convenient. We hold hands and cross the street. There it is.
We love the teachers, the free play, the outdoor space, and the overall teaching philosophy.
Our daycare is slightly subsidized relative to other Palo Alto daycares.
Vetting a daycare felt easier than vetting nannies (more parents to talk to; generally a longer history of care). Also, more seems to ride on the choice of nanny in the sense that one person will have a lot more influence on the kids than a team of teachers (though arguably this unlocks more benefits if you are able to find an incredible nanny).
We have learned to cope with illness. Nothing will take away all the terribleness, but we’re pretty proactive with ibuprofen, Tylenol, and anti-nausea medication. We’ve also learned that if we do saline rinses as soon as either kid has a stuffy nose, it seems to greatly reduce the number of ear infections they have.
I have a flexible job that lets me work from home and request back-up care on short notice. I’m mostly able to absorb the sick days in this way.
My wife would have a more nuanced view of the studies you cite. I do have this general impression that lots of parents are over-stressed as a feature of our mega-society, high-information exchange modern environment. Like, today, as parents, we are confronted with the kind of stories and data you only get if you are part of million-member+ society. It’s easy to feel haunted by all kinds of terrible stories and outcomes where, in reality, many of them are on par with other risk I’ve internalized (e.g., car accident risk on the way to the grocery store) (which is not to say we shouldn’t take car accident risks seriously).
This would seem to differ from our ancestral environment, where the data and folk traditions from maybe ~10,000 persons pointed more directly to high risk and high impact harms. “Do not eat that specific mushroom” or “Warn the kids about the river and supervise trips near the river more closely.”
I think our brains have trouble processing rare but high impact risks communicated out of our mega-societies, in part, because there are many, many, many more we have to track now. Don’t get me wrong—I am grateful that our mega-societies are helping us understand and mitigate child suffering. But I also think our poor ability to process all these risks may itself lead to actions which carry future risks on par with the risks we were supposed to be mitigating. It does not seem implausible to me that high parental stress or overbearing supervision may have serious downstream consequences on child welfare.
All of this is to say that, assuming daycare has significant convenience/happiness benefits and the studies show marginal risks (perhaps on par with other risks you have deemed appropriate), it can be okay to say, “I know we will be sick more, but this is still good for us.”
I hope I won’t be cooked here too much for my phrase “deem appropriate.” I’m not saying that in the sense that I’ve become indifferent to certain risks and harms (or worse, embraced them in the “sour grapes” way). It’s just to say that certain risks seem very difficult to avoid (e.g., transporting my child) and worrying about them past a certain point would seem detrimental to my mental health and my overall ability to function and flourish in this risky world of ours.