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Schools may remain closed until the end of the month under the plans the government is considering to stop the rapid spread of Covid-19.
Elementary and secondary schools were due to reopen next Monday, but the Cabinet is scheduled to consider keeping them closed for another two to three weeks.
The move comes as 6,110 new Covid cases were recorded along with six deaths. Meanwhile, 776 patients remained in the hospital last night after testing positive for Covid-19 while 70 people were in intensive care units.
A Cabinet Committee on Covid-19 will meet to discuss the escalating public health crisis, and a key focus of the meeting will be schools.
Education Minister Norma Foley will update the Cabinet subcommittee on the latest situation regarding schools.
Party leaders and ministers will consider asking schools to remain closed to stop the spread of the virus among students, teachers and their parents.
Plans to keep some schools open for the children of frontline workers and those with disabilities or who come from disadvantaged areas are also being discussed.
A government source said schools would be closed not because they are unsafe but to stop the movement of around a million people.
It comes as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson, announced that all schools and universities will close for the majority of students and will switch to remote learning from today in England. Schools in Scotland will close for the rest of January.
Last night, Medical Director Dr. Tony Holohan said that we will see a significant impact on the provision of education due to the increasing spread of Covid-19.
He said that there are decisions that the Government must make on the issue of schools and that they will meet this week.
Yesterday he spoke with Taoiseach Micheál Martin about schools. While transmission of the virus in school-going children is still below average, it is increasing at a very rapid rate.
He said they were looking at the contribution schools would make to streaming.
“We have made it clear that high levels of transmission pose a risk for all kinds of activities,” said Dr. Holohan. “We have been successful in protecting children and education, but you can see the position we are in now with very high levels of transmission.
“Those high rates now pose a risk to all of those goals.”
Professor Philip Nolan, chair of Nphet’s Irish Epidemiological Modeling Advisory Group, said the problem was not just what happens in schools, but what happens “around the service.
Meanwhile, the ministers of the three government parties anticipate that schools will not fully reopen next week due to the increasing number of Covid-19 cases.
A Fine Gael minister told the Irish independent: “Schools will not fully reopen next week.”
Meanwhile, a minister from Fianna Fáil said they would be “very surprised” if the government did not keep schools closed for longer after delaying their reopening until January 11.
A government spokesman said: “The schools will be discussed in the cabinet committee and then in the cabinet.”
“The Taoiseach had discussions today with the opposition leaders to update them on the situation,” he added.
Meanwhile, Green Party deputy director Catherine Martin is understood to be wary of reopening schools.
Ms. Martin, a former school teacher, believes that even if Nphet recommends opening schools, it will have to be done very differently to ensure that teachers, students and their
parents are safe.
Green Party leader Eamon Ryan said yesterday that he would wait to hear from Nphet.
However, the Minister of State of the Department of Education, Josepha Madigan, insisted yesterday that there is no advice against the reopening of schools next week.
If schools reopen, the elementary teachers union INTO wants them to have the flexibility to close and switch to remote learning if Covid makes it difficult for them to stay open.
That was part of a backup plan presented yesterday by the union to Education Minister Norma Foley.
The union is concerned that some principals are facing high levels of absence from Covid-related staff and cannot find a replacement to allow them to safely open the school.
Until now, schools had no authority to close to deal with the fallout from a Covid outbreak unless public health officials made such a recommendation.
In the first quarter, some schools here made the unilateral decision to close, but the Department of Education forced them to make a 180 degree turn.
In the north, Prime Minister Arlene Foster announced an extended period of distance learning for schools.
It came after ministers met to discuss their response to the deepening coronavirus crisis. Mrs. Foster said that
situation there was “terrible”.
“The advice we get is that we will have to act and that we will have to act very quickly,” he said when speaking before the meeting.
“I was very clear that I would like to keep the schools open as long as possible, but if it is the case that we need to close the schools, as we did in March last year, I will deeply regret it, but we will of course, take the necessary measures function of the medical evidence before us. “
Irish independent
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