Over the past four weeks, Omicron has risen rapidly in estimates. Even though not every Covid test is sent for genetic sequencing, the CDC works off samples and extrapolates estimates.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams tripled down on the idea that kids should be in schools despite the Omicron surge, and he insisted he is not in a battle with one of the city’s largest teachers’ unions over in-person learning in schools, saying instead he and the union president are on the “same page” and in “lock step.”

Adams told CNN’s Brianna Keilar on Tuesday that the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) president “understands that poor Black and brown children that are homeless, over 100,000 in the city, did not have access to high speed broadband. He understands that hundreds of thousands of children don’t have food at home to eat, the stabilizing diet for them comes from school, he understands the increase in attempted suicides when we closed down our schools before.”

Adams acknowledged that while he and the UFT President Michael Mulgrew may have a difference of opinion, he said he won’t feed into “hysteria.”

“It’s very clear, the safest place for children right now, is in a school building,” the mayor said.

Ahead of the return to school, the union sent in an email to its members saying they advised the mayor it would be “safest” to go to remote learning temporarily to mitigate staffing challenges upon the return, but ultimately the mayor felt “strongly” schools needed to remain open.

“It’s a luxury to say ‘stay at home’ when you have all the tools that you needed, but for Black, brown children that you don’t have access to some of the basic things, school is the best place for you, and I am going to continue to have my children be in a safe environment that all science is saying is the best place for him,” Adams told CNN.

When asked how he would advise parents to send their kids to school in the backdrop of pediatric hospitalizations at a record high, he said, “I’m saying to them your children are safer in schools than any other place based on the facts.” Earlier he said Covid-19 is a formidable opponent that pivots and shifts adding, “I’m going to do that” as well.

Adams, a parent himself, said “strand after strand, we can’t continue to stop our children from developing socially and academically … So we have to learn how to live with Covid, and live with Covid in a safe way.”

Asked about businesses scaling back their in-person employees, Adams said, “We have to open.”

“I know what we’re going through but what we must understand is that the resiliency of returning back to a normal life – if we don’t open our cities, we have almost 1 million people who are behind in their rent right here in this city, we have low-skilled employees who can’t do remote employment from home or telecommuting – that’s not a reality in a city like New York and across America, I need my cities to open and we have to be safe, we have to double down on vaccinations and booster shots, we have to double down on testing, but we have to reshape our thinking of how do we live with Covid,” he said.