It will be necessary to see if Level 5 restrictions are working before any decision is made to impose further restrictions, Minister for Children Roderick O’Gorman has said.
The advice from the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) at present was that schools were safe to open, he RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland, but the situation remained under constant review.
Level 5 restrictions had been introduced on December 24th and December 30th and it would take 10 to 14 days for their impact to be seen. A long shutdown of schools would not be good for children, he said, but the Government would keep the situation under review.
“We will make decisions based on public health advice,” Minister O’Gorman said.
“We need to see if Level 5 restrictions are working, we need to give the restrictions time to work. We need to be ready to do more if necessary.”
Vaccination priority
As for the position of the educational sector on the vaccination priority list, the Minister said if there were changes in the sector then that position would be reviewed.
Minister O’Gorman defended the Government’s plan for creches to remain open to care for the children of essential workers.
When asked if there should be a second list to prioritise health care workers, Mr O’Gorman said that a second list would confuse the situation.
However, he agreed that creches should prioritise cases where parents could not work from home.
It comes as childcare workers have called to be prioritised amid the roll-out of a Covid-19 vaccine, with some creches and full-day care service providers reopening Monday amid a third wave of the virus.
Teachers have also expressed concern ahead of the planned reopening on schools nationwide on January 11th.
The Government and the Department of Education have said they “fully intend” to reopen schools from this date, after last week extending the Christmas school holidays by three days to allow for people’s contacts to be minimised before children return.
Teachers will seek reassurances this week that it is safe for schools to reopen as planned, union representatives have said.
Minister O’Gorman said the increasing numbers surrounding Covid-19 in recent days were of concern.
However, he added that soaring numbers had been brought under control before and this time there was the added benefit of the vaccine.
