:quality(75)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/elcomercio/ZFEWHJYV5ZBSBMHRP4IZSUE5Y4.jpg "COVID-19 | Average daily vaccination of children was reduced by 40% in the last week: Is it feasible to return to school? | Coronavirus | UNICEF | Minsa | CMP | EC Data | PERU")
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In the country, vaccination against COVID-19 of children between 5 and 11 years old began on Monday, January 24. Only in Lima and Callao, the Government arranged 49 schools, 9 hospitals and differentiated spaces in the 76 vaccination centers to receive the little ones. “Definitely [la vacunación de los niños] It will strengthen us for the restart of classes as soon as possible,” declared the then Minister of Health, Hernando Cevallos.
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Three weeks later, with a questioned new minister At the head of the vaccination process and just before the start of classes, about 30% of this group of children have been vaccinated with one dose and only 0.11% with two doses. A figure lower than that recorded, in the same period, in the group of 12 to 17 years: 37% with one dose and 3.6% with two.
The Data Journalism Unit analyzed the vaccination figures of the Single National Health Information Repository (Reunis) of the Ministry of Health (Minsa) and determined that, in the last week, the daily percentage of vaccinated children between 5 and 11 years old was reduced by 40%. It has gone from vaccinating an average of 82,000 children a day in the Cevallos administration to only 48,000, in that of the current minister Hernan Condori.
“It is urgent and a priority that the vaccination of minors continue to be given at the rate at which it was being carried out,” says the doctor Leslie Soto, internist and infectologist at Hospital Cayetano Heredia and member of the Medical College of Peru (CMP), who asked the current administration not to lower its guard.
As he explains, the more children are vaccinated, the more feasible it will be to reach herd immunity. “The idea is that we have more than 95% of minors immunized so that this disease will not attack them, especially those who could have serious symptoms.”maintains and mentions that despite what is believed, there are children whose diagnoses could be complicated, especially if they suffer from some comorbidity such as obesity or asthma.
The regions of Apurimac, Cusco, Tacna, Ayacucho, Puno and Madre de Dios they do not exceed 20% of children vaccinated with one dose. While Huánuco does not cover even 10%. No region has 50% of children in this age group vaccinated with the first dose. Conversely, Callao, Ica, Lima Center and Lima South These are the areas with the most inoculated children.
If we consider the current rate of vaccination of minors, as of March 28, the Ministry of Education (Minedu) has scheduled the start of classes, it would be necessary to vaccinate 22% of children between 5 and 11 years old (923,248) with one dose, and barely 50% would be inoculated with two doses. With the rhythm given in the first two weeks, it would have been possible to vaccinate, at least with one dose, 100% of the minors.
In the districts of Lima, Magdalena, San Miguel, Magdalena, Pueblo Libre, Surquillo, La Perla, Carmen de la Legua and La Punta pass 50% of vaccinated children with one dose. While Punta Negra is the district with the lowest percentage of vaccinated children: just 17.33%. Most districts are between 30% and 40% of children with one dose.
Soto affirms that another point to take into account is the communication strategy for parents to take their children to be vaccinated. “Information on immunization has been low from the ministry, it has been understood that people should know and understand everything,” he maintains.
Although he assures that in the last part of Minister Cevallos’ administration an attempt was made to strengthen precisely this strategy, Soto points out that communication must be improved to provide more explanatory and clearer messages. “Myths must be demolished and it must be clarified that vaccines are safe, they do not alter anything, they do not cause children to have COVID-19″Explain.
Conditions in doubt for return to classes
In addition to vaccination, there are other basic and urgent conditions that must be generated for the return to face-to-face classes. Dr. Soto explains that it is necessary to ensure drinking water, adequate spaces, distancing, differentiated recreation, use of masks, among others.
With less than seven weeks to go until the scheduled start, there are still issues to be ironed out. DAniel Contreras, specialist in Education of the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) mentions that 7 out of 10 public schools require an improvement of their infrastructure. “We have been dragging this problem since before the pandemic and it may require a more long-term solution, but we must also think about emergency solutions”emphasizes.
An example of this is providing safe water to most schools to ensure handwashing. In addition, it must be ensured that all institutions can resolve the adequacy of their spaces for the proper ventilation of classrooms and all biosecurity measures.
“You have to consider that around 350 thousand schoolchildren from private institutions migrated to public schools between 2020 and 2021″, says Contreras who maintains that this high demand requires that spaces, furniture, teachers and materials for all students be taken into account for the return to face-to-face attendance. “It is vital to ensure maintenance and cleanliness. The abandonment in which some educational institutions could be is a problem that adds to the already existing deficiencies”, says.
From the beginning of 2021, the Comptroller General of the Republic has issued various monitoring reports on the state of schools at the national level. Of the supervised group, most do not have adequate infrastructure or spaces and despite the fact that funds have been given, the necessary repairs and maintenance have not been carried out.
For Contreras, generating emergency solutions to cover the necessary conditions for returning to face-to-face classes is urgent. “The complete development of the country is at stake in the following times,” he warns and emphasizes that Peru faces a challenge in which the option cannot be not to reopen. “The only option is to open because students and learning must be recovered”, he emphasizes. To date, there are more than 700 thousand students who have dropped out of school or have been about to do so.
One last point to take into account is the information provided both to schools and to the entire educational community. “Sometimes the norms are assumed to be known, that is legally correct, but it is not real and emphasis should be placed on socializing them”Contreras says. In the case of the information provided to parents and the community, the expert points out that a kind of national crusade should be oriented and promoted where everyone makes an effort to transmit messages through all channels that the evidence that schools are safe and they do not become a point of contamination if the right conditions are given.
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