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Portugal has 68 active outbreaks of contagion in schools by the new coronavirus, and no 477, corrected at the end of Friday afternoon (20) a note sent to the newsrooms by the office of the Secretary of State for Health, António Lacerda, who had advanced with a number 477 during the press conference to monitor the covid-19 pandemic.
“By mistake, active outbreaks were reported in the country on 11/16/2020, identified by the DGS, in a total of 477, to the detriment of the number of active outbreaks in kindergartens / schools / universities (public and private education), in the total of 68, and that is now clear ”, clarifies the office of António Lacerda.
The foci identified are distributed as follows: 3 in the north, 11 in the center, 50 in Lisbon and the Tagus valley, 2 in Alentejo and 2 in the Algarve, with a total of 68 in mainland Portugal. .
“It does not seem to us that the schools are the focus of great intensity,” António Lacerda Sales had mentioned at the press conference to follow up on the covid-19 pandemic.
The Secretary of State for Health had indicated that there were 291 outbreaks in schools in the Lisbon and Vale do Tejo region, 72 in the center, 58 in the north, 29 in Alentejo and 27 in the Algarve. But these numbers refer, after all, to the total number of outbreaks identified in the community, not just in schools.
“Nothing anticipates us” that it is necessary to change the school calendar, said the government official. who considered that “the health authorities do the job of properly segregating positive cases, high-risk contacts and low-risk contacts.”
Classes, school zones or entire establishments only close “if the health authority considers it appropriate, according to the risk stratification.”
WHO wants open schools
Currently, the policy of the World Health Organization (WHO) is to keep schools open during the pandemic.
“We must guarantee the education of our children”, The WHO director for Europe, Hans Kluge, said this Thursday, stressing that children and adolescents are not the main drivers of contagion and that closing schools is not efficient.
Kluge also emphasized that the lockdowns are “a waste of resources” and that they cause many side effects, such as damage to mental health or increased gender-based violence.
According to the same official, this measure would be avoidable if the use of masks were greater than 90% among the population.
Keeping most schools open in Europe for almost 100 days in a row is considered a source of satisfaction, as the closure can also affect the mental health of young people and have social consequences.
Although the use of a mask is not “a medicine” and must be supplemented with other measures, when there is less than 60% of use it is “difficult to avoid confinement,” he said at a digital press conference in Copenhagen. headquarters of the WHO regional office.
The defense of schools and the use of masks to avoid confinement were two of the central messages of Kluge, which he described as “great hope in the fight against the virus”, the news that emerged in recent days about the progress in several vaccine trials for covid. -19.
* Updated at 7:48 p.m., with the correction of the numbers sent by the office of the Secretary of State for Health
