SCHOOL REOPENING: Vaccination of teachers, students not guarantee that schools will be reopened soon

Uganda’s Ministry of Education and Sports has made it clear that the vaccination of teachers and students is not necessarily a guarantee that schools will be reopening soon.

In his previous address on the Covid19 response, President Yoweri Kaguta Tibuhaburwa Museveni said he would only reopen education institutions after teachers, non-teaching staff and learners, including those below the age of 12, have been vaccinated.

But there are no approved vaccines for children below 12.

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Only students in medical schools have returned to school.

One of these died days after taking an Astrazeneca vaccine jab.

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Education minister Janet Museveni has urged school heads to rally teachers and students to embrace vaccination as a way of expediting the reopening of schools.

According to Ministry of Education and Sports spokesperson Dr Dennis Mugimba, just over 183,000 teachers have taken the Covid19 vaccine out of the targeted 550,000 teachers countrywide.

A big number of those vaccinated are from the Kampala Metropolitan Area.

Government hopes to vaccinate at least 730,000 teaching and non-teaching staff.

But even as teachers embrace vaccination, Mugimba told reporters at the Uganda Media Centre in Kampala on September 02 that the vaccination of teachers doesn’t necessarily mean that reopening will happen soonest.

He made it clear that even if all teachers and non-teaching staff were vaccinated, reopening of school was “not dependent on vaccination alone.”

Mugimba explained that just like one cannot rely on the temperature gauge to determine the condition of a car, “there are other things to consider” before reaching a decision to reopen education institutions.