The Taiwan Youth Association for Democracy yesterday called for supplementary measures to the standards guiding the suspension of in-person classes in the event of a COVID-19 infection cluster in a classroom.
Elementary and junior-high school students are to begin the new semester on Tuesday next week.
The Ministry of Education has said it would announce new COVID-19 prevention and response measures for schools at a news conference at the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) in Taipei today.
Photo courtesy of Dingnei Elementary School
The Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) has reported that the new mechanism would be implemented in two phases.
The first phase would cover the first three weeks of the new semester, during which the response measure would remain the same: suspending a class for three days if a student is confirmed to have COVID-19.
In the second phase, which would begin in the fourth week of the new semester, classmates of a confirmed case would be allowed to continue in-person classes if they test negative in a rapid test the day after the initial case is confirmed.
Rapid tests are to be provided by schools.
The association yesterday on Facebook said the Omicron BA.5 subvariant of SARS-CoV-2 is expected to drive a new COVID-19 wave in Taiwan.
Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), who is the CECC’s spokesperson, has said cases might peak around the time when schools open next week, it added.
The association said many students support the second phase of the new class suspension standard, as they would not face frequent class suspensions and disruptions to their education.
However, some students are concerned that if more than five students in a classroom are diagnosed with COVID-19, which they considered a relatively serious cluster, they could be at high risk of infection if they continue to attend classes, the group said.
It suggested that schools be ordered to suspend classes if more than half of the students in a class take disease prevention leave, or if a cluster reaches a certain level of risk, it said.
The government implemented the “325” system when the A(H1N1) influenza virus was spreading in Taiwan in 2009, the association said.
The “325” system requires that if, within three days, two students in the same class are infected, the class should be closed for five days.
The ministry could set a standard according to the severity of each COVID-19 cluster, it said.
As COVID-19 has an incubation period before symptoms begin, some students are concerned that taking only one rapid test provided by the school would not be enough, as it might take three to five days before infected students test positive, the association added.
It asked whether students could receive more rapid test kits if they develop symptoms after a few days.
The CECC yesterday reported 22,137 new local COVID-19 cases and 26 deaths from the disease.
Additional reporting by CNA
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