A Tennessee student appeared to be laughed at during a school board meeting in Rutherford County after telling the audience his grandmother caught and died of COVID-19 after someone didn’t wear a face mask.

According to theDaily News Journal, Grady Knox — a junior at Central Magnet — spoke Tuesday at a Rutherford County Board of Education meeting, where he laid out the concerns students have faced since schools reopened following the start of the pandemic. Some of these apprehensions, he said, aren’t just about students becoming infected with the virus, but their family members as well.

“I’m worried about my family,” Knox said during the meeting, which was uploaded toYouTube. “If I get COVID, I’m going to bring it to my family, and I talk to my grandparents a lot. They are higher risk than me, so I don’t want to give them COVID.”

As Knox spoke (his speech begins around the1:10:35mark in the video), maskless adults displayed signs that read “Let our children smile” behind him.

To further express the importance of his concerns, Knox revealed he already lost a loved one to the disease, which has killed 654,061 Americans as of Thursday afternoon, according toaNew York Timesdatabase.

“This time last year, my grandmother, who was a former teacher at the Rutherford County school system, died of COVID because someone wasn’t wearing a mask,” Knox, who was supporting a school mask mandate, said.

A group of audience members laughed and shook their heads after Knox spoke about his grandmother, and at least one man attempted to interrupt him as he tried to continue speaking.

A representative of the school board did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.

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In an interview withCNN, Knox said he didn’t immediately recognize the ridicule coming from the audience was directed his way.

“I just hope that they see that they’ve given me this chance now to speak in front of the entire nation and tell about how I believe masks are something that is really essential for schools to stay open,” Knox told the outlet. “And I hope that they see that this is really just benefiting me and people that believe in masks all across the country.”

On average, there are about 148,563 new COVID-19 infections each day in the U.S., which is a 2-percent drop over the last two weeks. About 53 percent of the country is fully vaccinated, while 63 percent have received at least one dose, theTimessaid.

source: people.com