Coronavirus: Don’t allow students come home for Mid-Sem break – GES advised

Immunologist and a Research Fellow with the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR), Dr. Kwadwo Asamoah Kusi, has advised the Ghana Education Service (GES) to halt the mid-semester break it has declared for final year students preparing for the 2021 WASSCE examination.

His advice follows the report that students in some Senior High Schools (SHS) have been infected with COVID-19 and H1N1 viral infections.

The Immunologist in an interview with Samuel Eshun on the Happy Morning Show stated: “Releasing the students home is not the right decision. At least, all students who will be allowed to go home should be tested. The ideal situation should have been that the schools have a system of isolating infected students. That will be the best.

This is because the chances that infected students can spread the disease in the communities in which they live are very high.

As it stands, keeping them in school is better and making sure that those who are infected are in a separate space from those who are not infected is the best option.”

Some students of the Akuse Methodist Senior High Technical School (AMEST) in the Eastern Region have contracted three different viral infections; a situation that calls for immediate high-level attention to contain.

So far, 19 students of the school, which is in the Lower Manya Krobo Municipality, have tested positive for avian flu (H1N1); COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2), and Human Coronavirus (Hcov-229E), including nine of them having co-infections (HCV-229E +H1N1).

Meanwhile, in a communique issued by the Ghana Health Service dated July 16, 2021, all heads of Senior high schools have been informed to allow form 3 students to go for a mid-semester break from Tuesday, July 20 to Sunday, July 25, 2021.

It adds, however, that they should permit any student who wishes to stay in school to do so while adhering to all school rules and regulations.