Dr Amar delivers his presentation during the webinar.
KUCHING (Sept 13): School-children aged 12 to 17 as well as the teachers and other school staff should have received their Covid-19 vaccines before the reopening of schools, senior consultant paediatrician Dato Dr Amar Singh HSS has recommended.
Adding on, he said all students should undergo vaccination beginning now, and the roll-out should continue until this year’s end.
Dr Amar also suggested that the management of all schools would focus on improving the ventilation in classrooms, offices, toilets as well as other rooms, as a way to curb the spread of the virus.
His suggestions included reducing the use of air-conditioning, opening the windows and doors of most rooms, providing standing fans, using portable air cleaners and carbon dioxide (CO2) monitors, and keeping the exhaust fans in toilets on.
He also recommended weekly saliva-based RTK-Antigen testing for all teachers, staff members and students.
“We should advocate for the government to make available free or very cheap saliva-based RTK-Antigen tests (for them) to do weekly home-testing,” he said during a webinar on ‘Reopening School Safely, and Should Our Children Be Vaccinated?’ conducted by the Dignity for Children Foundation last Saturday.
Dr Amar also suggested keeping students in their ‘class-safety bubble’ and preventing them from mixing with those from other classes.
“This can help limit the spread of the virus, and thus, avoid the shutdown of the whole school should there be a positive case.
“If one child in a class has been exposed to or is infected with Covid-19, then the whole class (including the teacher) should stop attending school until they’re cleared after testing and quarantine.
“Existing Covid-19 preventive measures should remain in practice such as physical distancing, wearing of face masks, as well as frequent contact-surface disinfection.
“The parents should also be involved in decision-making in schools.”
Dr Amar also called upon the schools to monitor community transmission and to close physical classrooms should the transmission rates become very high.
“The schools should be able to transition flexibly to either hybrid learning, or online learning.
“The schools should prepare to have sessions where half of the students would be in class and the other half at home (attending online class).
“If someone is infected, we move back to online (classes),” he said, adding that the same system could also be applied to preschools and primary schools.
“The only difference is all staff members and teachers (preschools and primary schools) must be vaccinated as the approved Covid-19 vaccine, the Pfizer-BioNTech brand, is only eligible for children aged 12 and above.”
On the weekly RTK-Antigen testing, Dr Amar proposed for the management of preschools and primary schools to expedite the use of test kits suitable for young children.
“For these pupils, having them undergo swabbing right up to their nose could be tricky. There are new kits coming up where they can gargle and spit out (samples).
“There’s another kit coming up, called the ‘lollipop kit’ that a child can suck like a lollipop, leaving the sample on the kit, ready for testing. That is what being used for children in some countries,” he added.