Omicron: School closures must be ‘avoided whenever possible’

(United Nations News) COVID-19 cases are spiking all over the world, but the Executive Director of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said on Friday that despite the rise of the highly transmissible Omicron variant “nationwide school closures should be avoided whenever possible.”

“When COVID-19 community transmission increases and stringent public health measures become a necessity, schools must be the last places to close and the first to re-open”, argued Henrietta Fore.

The new cases are being fuelled, increasingly, by Omicron; the new variant of concern that public health experts and scientists are working hard to understand and assess.

Amid rising uncertainty, many governments are weighing whether to keep schools open.

Ms. Fore said that one thing was certain: “Another wave of widespread school closures would be disastrous for children.”

Read more at: United Nations News

Source: CARICOM TODAY