Covid-19: ‘West Bengal govt wants 85% vaccination cover for teens before school reopening decision’ – Times of India

KOLKATA: Calcutta High Court directed the state government to clarify its stand on reopening of schools to the court by the next hearing on February 14. But advocate general S N Mookherjee contended the state wanted to vaccinate at least 85% school students below 18 years before taking a decision.
When the division bench of Justice Prakash Shrivastava and Justice Rajarshi Bharadwaj sought the state’s opinion as it took up the four petitions on reopening of schools on Friday, Mookherjee said the state would submit its position after consultation with the West Bengal Disaster Management Authority and health, education and home departments in a week. Mookherjee submitted a school vaccination status report, which showed 74.8% inoculation coverage by the state school education department till January 25. Vaccination in most south Bengal districts, including Kolkata and Howrah, were below the 85% target, while that for Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Cooch Behar, Alipurduar, Murshidabad and Purulia is above 85%.
The senior state counsel said the government was monitoring the situation daily. “Students below 18 years couldn’t take the vaccine till January 3. There are 45 lakh students in the 15-18 year age group who need vaccination. Of them 33 lakh have been given the first dose. There has to be a gap of two to three weeks between the first and the second doses. We want to cover at least 85% students,” Mookherjee said.
Senior counsel for petitioners Bikash Bhattacharya pointed out schools in many other states had resumed on-campus classes. He said that the prolonged shutdown of schools was taking a psychological effect on school students and also leading to a spike in dropout rates. “Let schools reopen with proper distancing norms. Why are schools being kept closed when all other activities are on with Covid restrictions?” he said.
The advocate general conceded there was a “hell and heaven difference” between online teaching and holding in-person classes, particularly when there were connectivity problems in rural areas. “We are all eager to open schools. We have initiated open-air classes in neighbourhoods (paara shikshayatan). But we have to tread with caution. The responsibility of reopening schools lies with the state government. We had reopened schools ahead of the Pujas but were forced to go in for a shutdown,” said Mookherjee, pointing to the alert from the Institute of Child Health about Omicron and Delta variants affecting child health.
The advocate general also expressed concern over Omicron spreading fast. “We have to take a policy decision. We invite proposals from stakeholders. The state is in a dialogue with all concerned. We invite suggestions from all concerned on how to go about it,” he said. Contesting petitioners’ argument that classes had resumed in Europe, Mookherjee said, “We also have statistics from several schools in Europe that didn’t start classes despite having an improved health infrastructure.”