About 98 teachers and 1,800 school pupils have tested positive to COVID-19 in the Western Cape province of South Africa.
Schools across the country were reopened June 1, with the current development forcing 20 schools to close. However, the Western Cape Provincial Minister of Education, Debbie Schafer, said the spike in the number of confirmed cases of Coronavirus was not as a result of the reopening of schools. “Of this number, 1,537 cases were reported before the schools were reopened,” Ms Schafer said.
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She said the provincial Education Department had spent R280 million (US$16.3 million) on hygiene supplies adding that schools were equipped with digital thermometers, hand sanitiser, liquid soap, and cleaning supplies, while pupils and teachers were provided with two masks each.
However, an opposition leader, Mmusi Maimane, fronting civil society group One South Africa Movement, said it was premature for children to be back at school, going by the statistics, which pegged the number of confirmed cases at 55,421 with 1,210 recorded deaths, as of Thursday.
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Maimane said the environment was not yet conducive for a return to classrooms. “President Cyril Ramaphosa has failed to respond to our letter and petition. We gave him 48 hours. He is leaving us with no choice. We have engaged Advocate Dali Mpofu and we will meet this government in court. We will not gamble with our children’s lives,” he said. Meanwhile, schools across the country are to be disinfected this week.
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