DAMASCUS, Syria (North Press) – Residents of Syria’s capital Damascus fear an outbreak of coronavirus among their children as the new school year is set to begin soon.
Despite the Syrian Ministry of Education announcing a health protocol to limit the coronavirus outbreak, the measures stipulated that there should be less crowding in classrooms, a decrease in the length of the school day and training school health personnel to discover suspected cases and act upon the appearance of infections at school.
However, the protocols were subject to mockery among some residents on social media, considering it as inapplicable in the absence of its condition’s implementation.
Wisal Al-Khair (a pseudonym) a mother of two students, said that residents were accustomed to all government health measures being unfulfilled.
Ministry of Health officials said that Damascus was recently seen as the epicenter of coronavirus in the country due to the large number of infections, overcrowding of hospitals with cases, and high numbers of dead.
On Friday, the Syrian Ministry of Health recorded 59 new infections of coronavirus, bringing totals of infections in Syrian government areas to 2,563, including 584 recoveries and 103 deaths.
Last week, the government team decided to postpone the beginning of school year from early September to the 13th.
Parents and school administrators believe that it is too early to open schools in the light of coronavirus outbreak, calling for a virtual learning system similar to the one many countries have adopted.
Safaa Ahmed (a pseudonym) an administrator in a school in Damascus, said that the start of school will have serious repercussions on the health situation in the country.
The administrator suggested replacing the traditional education system with an electronic system and providing the infrastructure for its implementation instead of being preoccupied with issuing protocols that are difficult to implement on the ground.
In a statement Sunday, the Syrian government said that the health protocol guarantees the preservation of students’ health and that of workers in the field of education.
Some teachers fear the loss of a “significant number” of teaching staff, as happened with dozens of important doctors who lost their lives as a result of their infection with coronavirus.