Filenews 12 January 2022 - Marilena Panagi
The daily detection of positive cases in nursing homes and the non-compliance of fans and sports agents with the protection measures during football matches, were raised yesterday for discussion during the meeting of health minister Michalis Chatzipandelas with the members of the Advisory Scientific Committee. That is why the decisions taken, which the Minister of Health will put today, as recommendations before the Council of Ministers, include the relevant proposals. High on the agenda, of course, was education, which is also covered by some of the suggestions that will be discussed today by the Ministry.
According to information provided by "F", the members of the TEU expressed strong concern about the situation prevailing in nursing homes, since, as it was found in the last three weeks, positive cases are detected almost daily in nursing homes all over Cyprus.
Analyzing the data, as they emerge from the process of tracing, scientists and the Minister of Health, decided that it is imperative to apply even stricter protection measures for the elderly and the elderly who live in such places. That is why it was finally announced that in addition to the ban on some visitors that had been decided last week, a proposal for the mandatory presentation of a negative test by those entering nursing homes, regardless of vaccination history, will be submitted to the Council of Ministers today.
Information from "F" reports that the evidence so far has shown that people who have received all three doses of the vaccine and are asymptomatic are infected and unknowingly transfer the virus to the rest of the people who are in the same place. Fortunately, for the time being, the increase in cases in nursing homes has not turned into an increased number of elderly patients in hospitals.
As far as education is concerned, the data of the last few days has also been analysed and the will of all for open schools and in-person classes has been re-emphasised. In order to achieve this goal, the TEU adopted a proposal that was put before it and it provided for the introduction of the "test to stay" practice, which has been applied since the previous year in several countries and in the schools of Cyprus.
This measure, which will be applied in both Primary and Secondary Education, provide that with the detection of a positive case in a department, all other students and / or teachers of the same department are subjected on the spot to a test (the possibility of granting a self-test to all school units is being studied) and those who have a negative result remain in their class with the procedure being repeated for the next three days.
For the implementation of the "test to stay", the Ministry of Health is already in the process of drafting proposals concerning practical issues and the relevant announcements will be made in the coming days and if and when the proposal is finally adopted today by the Council of Ministers.
In addition to granting free self-tests to school units, the Ministry of Health is also studying the possibility of operating separate sampling centres at various points in the provinces, solely to serve students and teachers. It is also possible that schools may be served by mobile units.
For schools, a change in the health protocol followed should be expected and it is not excluded that a proposal will be adopted on the basis of which, in Primary Education (where it is easier to implement), classes will be closed only in the absence of a teacher who cannot be replaced.
Finally, as far as the stadiums are concerned, as the Minister of Health pointed out in his statements after the meeting with the members of the TEU, "football teams are given one last chance to impose order among their fans, to strictly observe the protection measures and to use protective masks in all areas". If, as the Health Minister said, "this is not done, then we will come back and unfortunately we will have to close the stadiums. That is, football matches will be held without fans."
Clear intentions for schools
However, as far as their intentions for education are concerned, both the Minister of Health Michalis Chatzipandelas and the head of the TEU Konstantinos Tsioutis were clear, with Mr. Tsioutis even stressing that "we want some places, such as schools, to definitely support them, and that is why we are trying to exploit all the weapons at our disposal, as are the tests, that's why we suggested the introduction of the "test to stay" in school units. "Beyond that," he said, "our goal is to keep the economy open and not to affect our own activity either. Inevitably, this cannot be fully achieved, clearly we are affected, but we are trying to deal with this outbreak of the pandemic with social needs as a more-minded basis.
For his part, the Health Minister said that "every day we will monitor and evaluate hospitalizations and if there is an outbreak, then there will be an emergency session and if additional measures have to be taken, they will be taken. For now we are continuing with the existing measures." Asked to comment on whether any proposal for the granting of the fourth dose to the elderly was put on the table, the Minister of Health noted that "there was a position, specifically from Mr. Karagiannis, from whom I asked, at the next meeting, to present more data".
