Parental boarding school visits resume

Rutendo Nyeve, Sunday News Reporter

THE Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education has given greenlight to the resumption of organised parental visits to boarding schools after they were banned due to the Covid 19 pandemic.

The Ministry announced the revised decision following the Post-Cabinet Briefing on the 9 May 2023 which stated that the World Health Organisation (WHO) had released a statement indicating that COVID-19 no longer constitutes as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.

In a statement, the Ministry’s permanent secretary, Mrs Tumisang Thabela said:

“In line with the Government position, on 9 June 2023 the Ministry of Health and Child Care issued a circular allowing the lifting of COVID-19 containment measures which included restriction of both local and foreign travel, home quarantine, vaccination of citizens 12 years and above, screening of travelers, isolation of cases, supervision of burials, disinfection of premises, and other standard operating procedures which assisted the country in reducing the spread and impact of the pandemic.

“In view of the foregoing, the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education has revised its position on parental visits to children at boarding schools. With immediate effect, heads of schools are allowed to resume the previous practice of organised parental visits to schools,” reads the statement.

The Ministry however, will maintain temperature screening, strict hand-washing, availability of clean water, and high standards of sanitation and hygiene at every learning institution as permanent measures for mitigating against any communicable and influenza-like diseases in our schools.

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