The Leiden student association Minerva is suspending the introductory activities for the new academic year. Minerva is the first of the major student associations to take this step.
The reason is a number of infections within the association. The society on Breestraat will not be closed yet. The problem is mainly in student houses.
This concerns several buildings on the Rapenburg and Hooigracht and some twenty student houses spread across the center. Visitors would also have been infected at a women’s house on Haagweg.
Both mayor Henri Lenferink and the highest boss of the university, rector Carel Stolker, praised the students for their measures, but at the same time warned that the student houses must comply with the RIVM measures more closely. Parties would be held under the guise of hospiteren.
Mayor calls numbers ‘very worrying’
The Mayor of Leiden, also chairman of the Hollands-Midden Safety Region, is on edge now that the number of infections is increasing rapidly. “There are relatively many infections in the student world, but so far we have not found any infections that have been contracted in any of the societies”, says Lenferink.
“Yes at parties and hospital evenings, but there are also students who have taken the virus with them from holidays or activities elsewhere and subsequently infected housemates.”
In a letter that the mayor sent to the city on Wednesday, he also discusses the spread of the corona virus in student houses. He calls the numbers “very worrying”.
The cabinet will hold a national emergency meeting on Friday. A press conference will then follow. Then it will also be announced which regional measures will be taken.
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