The Namibian National Teachers Union (Nantu) has called on teachers to get vaccinated, saying at least 112 teachers have died from COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic last year.
Nantu secretary general Loide Shaanika told Nampa on Tuesday the education sector has been hit hard as there was a surge in infections and deaths among educators, especially in June and July this year during Namibia’s third wave.
The union, the education ministry and the Namibia National Students Organisation (Nanso) have launched a vaccination campaign encouraging teachers, support staff, eligible learners, as well as parents to get vaccinated.
Since the launch of the campaign on 25 June, about 600 teachers from the Erongo, Khomas, Oshikoto and Kavango East regions have been vaccinated. Oshikoto leads in terms of vaccination with about 320 teachers vaccinated thus far.
“The ultimate goal is to have everyone vaccinated as it will help us have safe school environments and return to our normal way of living. Most importantly, it prevents severe illness and/or hospitalisation once one gets infected. The union would like to encourage every member of society, especially within our school communities, to get vaccinated,” Shaanika said.
Education Minister Anna Nghipondoka last week during the COVID-19 briefing said the loss of teachers could traumatise learners. In this regard, the ministry has started training teachers to offer psychosocial support to learners upon their return to school.
At the same event, Nghipondoka also called on teachers to get vaccinated.
She further said the ministry has observed that there was no significant drop in infection rates between when schools were open and when they closed.
“There was only a 0.2 per cent drop in infection rates among teachers and 1.6 per cent drop in infection among learners in the past few weeks while schools were closed. This means children get infected with COVID-19 while at home as much as they do while at school,” she explained.
The Ministry of Health and Social Services in partnership with the United States Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, Africa Field Epidemiology Network and Unicef in April did a study in eight of the highest COVID-19 burdened regions to assess the epidemiology of the outbreaks.
The study found that schools are not superspreaders of COVID-19 and children equally get infected while at home or within communities.
A summary of that report released by the American Embassy on Monday said schools are not isolated superspreader venues, but rather form part of the bigger picture of community transmission.
The findings further note that children living in school hostels are at the greatest risk of COVID-19 infection as outbreaks in schools were more common in schools that had a hostel than those without.
This is because when a case occurs in hostels, there is limited spread to day learners as cases are often quickly detected and isolated. The results showed these cases still come from the community when learners staying in the hostels visit local healthcare facilities or local shops.
In this regard, Nghipondoka said although social distancing is a problem in schools, government is working around the clock to ensure that school environments are safe.
She said with the N.dollars 800 million allocated to the ministry for COVID-19 infrastructure development, they have renovated 84 hostels and constructed 34 new hostel blocks to ensure social distancing.
A total of 235 new ablution facilities have also been constructed, while 243 have been renovated.
Source: Namibia Press Agency
