The quarantine exception for teachers and kindergarten employees during working hours can lead to them being in the leisure quarantine well into the spring, says deputy head of the Education Association Hege Valås. She is not the only one who reacts.
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From 1 January 2022, employees in schools and kindergartens will be exempted from infection quarantine during working hours.
Employees who have been in close contact with an infected person can go to work, but must be tested on days 3 and 7 after the close contact, the Ministry of Health and Care Services writes in a press release on Monday.
– As I perceive the new rules, it is the case that teachers and kindergarten employees are exempted from quarantine during working hours, but that they must be quarantined in their free time. It is unreasonable and illogical, says Hege Valås, deputy leader of the Education Association to VG.
– With that, we can get a situation where they are at work, but will be in the leisure quarantine well beyond the spring, she says.
–– Concerned about the best possible offer
Neither the Ministry of Health nor the Ministry of Education has been available for VG’s inquiries on Monday night.
In a press release, Minister of Health and Care Services Ingvild Kjerkol states the following:
– The government is concerned that children and young people should receive the best possible offer and that schools and kindergartens should be as open as possible.
– Logical deficiency
The Education Association has a great understanding of this, says Valås.
– If it is the case that it is justifiable with exemption from quarantine during working hours, it is a logical shortcoming that teachers can meet dozens of students during the working day, but not pick up their child in kindergarten after working hours, Valås says to VG.
– We support the government in keeping kindergartens and schools open. It is important for the children, but we have been at the forefront of the pandemic and risked becoming infected. Before Christmas, it was sometimes children and young people who had the highest infection pressure and there is no reason to believe that it will be less throughout the spring. It is very good that teachers and kindergarten staff are given priority over testing and dose three, so that they are more protected.
The National Association of Schools: – Should run at a red level
On Monday, the government gave employees in schools and kindergartens exemptions from infection quarantine during working hours. The national association of schools would rather have a red level.
– The provision actually means that they send all employees in schools and kindergartens out where there is a lot of infection, without infection control equipment, says union leader Mette Johnsen Walker to NTB.
She is not happy with the government’s decision to give employees at schools and kindergartens exemptions from the infection quarantine during working hours – so-called leisure quarantine. She says that members are more worried about being infected in the workplace than in their free time.
– The government should run at a red level until they get control of the infection, at least until enough personnel receive a refreshing dose of the vaccine, Walker says.
Norsk Lektorlag: – Absurd
Leader of the Norwegian Teachers’ Association, Rita Helgesen, informs VG that they have received many reactions to the new quarantine rules from their members on Monday night
– Experiences from this autumn showed that testing for the quarantine system was not perceived as safe enough. It will probably be perceived as also absurd that it is then defined as safe enough to work, but that one must stay at home in one’s free time. This is not entirely clear, she writes in an e-mail.
The Norwegian Association of Lecturers believes that the new quarantine rules will create more insecurity.
– This is a very bad solution and will help create more fear and insecurity in an already pressured occupational group that has been more or less unprotected with few or no infection control measures for a long time, Helgesen writes.
The exception does not apply if the employee is in the same household or similarly close to the person who is infected.
The government has also decided to maintain the red level for the country’s high schools, despite the fact that both the Norwegian Directorate of Health and the National Institute of Public Health (NIPH) believed that the level could be lowered to yellow after Christmas.
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