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For the Swedish Teachers Association, the members speak of a work situation of pressure with high sick leave, narrow premises and difficulties to maintain distances. Following the recommendations of the Swedish Public Health Agency is often impossible, according to President Johanna Jaara Åstrand.
The DN survey shows that schools across the country have been forced to close and switch to distance education for periods of time, often due to high sickness absence among teachers.
Already this spring, the Swedish Public Health Agency published a report indicating that teachers do not belong to a professional category that is particularly exposed to covid-19. The report was questioned by several researchers, in part because the authority did not take into account background factors such as age, gender and where in the country the teachers were located.
At the end of last week The authority presented a new report examining the prevalence of covid-19 among teachers in Sweden. The Swedish Public Health Agency states that primary school teachers, preschool teachers and child caregivers are not at increased risk of being diagnosed with COVID-19 compared to other occupational groups.
“The results show that school and contact with groups of children do not constitute a particularly risky environment for the spread of infection,” Anders Tegnell said in a statement.
The new report also contains significant shortcomings, according to the researchers DN spoke with.
Jonas Björk, professor of epidemiology at the University of Lund, points out that the Swedish Public Health Agency has solved occupational categories in which it has not found any cases of covid-19, which means that the risks in the teaching group may seem minor than they really are.
– They also do not take into account that the spread of the infection in the spring was by far the largest in the Stockholm region, which has a different population composition than the rest of the country. That should have been taken into account. To be honest, no conclusion can be drawn from his report, says Jonas Björk.
– Basically I think it has been prudent to keep the schools open, but we must be able to assess how the spread of the infection has reliably affected teachers and society in general.
“I think it is serious that one tries so hard and claims that teachers are not exposed to a greater risk of contracting COVID-19 than others without reservation,” says researcher Per Adman.
Photo: Thomas Karlsson
Also Per Adman and his research colleague Jonas Larsson Taghizadeh, from the Department of Political Science at Uppsala University, has criticized the method in discussion articles in GP and Expressen. Like Jonas Björk, they wonder why the Swedish Public Health Agency does not single out upper secondary teachers when investigating the prevalence of covid cases among primary school teachers.
– We know from other research that infectivity increases with age. It’s important if you meet kids in their teens compared to moving between toddlers in elementary school, says Per Adman.
The result runs the risk of being misleading, according to Per Adman.
– I think it is serious that he comes out so hard and claims that teachers are not exposed to a greater risk of contracting covid-19 than others without reservation, says Per Adman.
Svante Tideman, first vice president of the National Union of Teachers, sees major issues in the Public Health Agency report as the basis for decisions at the school level.
– Above all, I react to the fact that the survey groups all primary school teachers into one category when we know that the risk of spreading the infection increases with the age of the children. It may mean that teachers have a false sense of security, he says.
I see the after school school being forced to close due to the spread of the infection and many teachers getting sick. If teaching is to be offered, teachers must stay healthy,
Johanna Jaara Åstrand from the Teachers Association does not want to comment on the method behind the report in more detail, but says the result does not really reflect her picture of the reality of teachers.
– I see that after school school is forced to close due to the spread of infection and many teachers getting sick. If teaching is to be offered, teachers must stay healthy, he says.
Britta Björkholm, Director of the infection control and health protection department at the Swedish Public Health Agency says the analysis behind the report was not conducted for research purposes, but as the basis for decisions on measures at the school level. Comparing it to a research report is wrong, you think.
– We are aware that there are a number of parameters that we could study and that it would be interesting to analyze more closely. But for the scope of use that we have seen before, it has been most interesting to start with how the school is organized. This is how we can make decisions about measurements, he says.
Wouldn’t it have been interesting, given that it is part of the decision-making process, to differentiate between those who teach 7’s and 16’s?
– In the data we have available, from Statistics Sweden, there is no such division on a personal level. But if in the future there is a need for division in our analyzes, it is possible that progress will be made.
