BASSETERRE, St. Kitts (Friday 20th August 2021)-“If parents do not want their children to be vaccinated, as far as the Ministry of Education is concerned, there is nothing we can do. We leave that for the law makers, the legal authorities, the competent authorities, the government to decide what will happen.”

So said Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education William Hodge when he appeared on ‘Leadership Matters’ weekly episode aired on ZIZ Tuesday 17th August 2021. He was at the time responding to questions about if all teachers are vaccinated and also what will the Ministry do about parents who do not want their children  to get vaccinated.

“So what I would say is that we will cross that bridge when we get to it but certainly I would want to encourage teachers, parents and adults who work with children to get vaccinated,” he added.

“I really would have loved to say yes teachers are fully vaccinated,” he started out in his response about the vaccination status of teachers whilst noting that measures have been in place including informational sessions and nurses and medical personnel being present to administer vaccines after such sessions.

Hodge continued: “We would expect that teachers as leaders in the community will be amongst the persons who would want to get vaccinated first, quickly because they recognise the importance of this.”

As shared by him: “Not a significant number of teachers have been vaccinated.”
He pointed to data from the Ministry of Health in making that observation, saying further: “Infact, the data that we looked at didn’t just show teachers but it also showed persons who work in schools…school meals and other departments and units within the Ministry of Education…”

The Education official then encouraged teachers to go out and get vaccinated “especially as we prepared to move back to face to face instructions in schools.”
“Now that we have the vaccine that has added another layer of protection for teachers themselves and if teachers are serious about their own health…and the quotation said earlier ‘Health is the new wealth’, they have to go out and be vaccinated and to encourage others as well as to ensure to encourage the children in their charge when we get to that point  to be vaccinated,” he noted.

In addressing the impact of the COVID-19 virus on young people, Hodge said: “Yes I did say that persons of all ages are contracting the virus. Our children and young people are affected.  Of the 558 cases on the outbreak from May 19th to August 3rd, 113 of these 558 cases were children. 11. 2 % of the total cases were children ages 0 to 9 and 12.6% of the total cases were between the ages of 10 to 19. 31 of this number was secondary and tertiary level students who could not write their CSEC or CAPE examinations in July/August, and this was because they or someone in their household contracted a virus and had to be in isolation or in quarantine. This has been a tremendous setback for our students who now have to wait until January or June of 2022 to write their examinations.”

He went on to say: “ As we are all aware a number of our students at the primary and secondary levels have been stricken by the virus and this resulted in our schools coming to a screeching halt. Schools were closed prematurely to contain the spread of the virus. We all know too well that school closures do have crippling effects  not only on students’ learning but equally on school closures have crippling effects on our economy.  If our daycare centres, nurseries and schools are to remain closed, this has serious implications for the successful and safe reopening of the economy. This is not a textbook information; we have all lived through this over the past 18 months.”

He talked about the encouragement of adults, parents, guardians, men and women “who work with our children and young people to get vaccinated.”

“That encouragement continues this evening. At this juncture, I’m happy and I commend the government for securing the Pfizer vaccine that can be administered to children and youth 12 to 18 years old,” he added.

Hodge said shortly the Ministry of Health will partner with the Ministry of Education to roll out the administration of the Pfizer vaccine.

“We make a special appeal to teachers, parents to support this process. Children younger than 12 at this point cannot be vaccinated. They will continue to depend on their parents, guardians and teachers for protection.”