M.O.E. Organizes Meeting to Address Teachers’ COVID-19 Concerns

While we were with Chief Education Officer, Doctor Carol Babb, the media asked about recently made remarks by B.N.T.U. National President Elena Smith as it relates to the concerns of teachers of contracting COVID-19 in the current way of teaching. The worry is that they can get infected while handling packages that are handed over to parents and collected weekly.  On Wednesday, the Ministry of Education will be holding a meeting with various managements for an update on the COVID-19 pandemic; Director of Health Services, Doctor Marvin Manzanero will be the guest speaker. Doctor Carol Babb says that it is being organized to allay all concerns that teachers and school managements may have.

Carol Babb

Dr. Carol Babb, Chief Education Officer

“I am not a medical doctor, but Doctor Manzanero commented on Facebook and he said that there is no truth to that; they don’t have any evidence—that’s just a comment. So I think you shouldn’t make comments like that without doing the results. According to Doctor Manzanero, he doesn’t believe that teachers can get…I am not saying that it is impossible, but I strongly believe that before you make a strong statement like that, you should do the research. We advise teachers to hand sanitize, maybe even wear gloves when they are giving out these packages. So we ask them to be careful. The ministry of Education along with their partners, we have given them sanitization supplies and if the schools still want we can still give to them; it is still available. I have asked him to a meeting so that he can explain that having teachers in school is safe. Most teachers are in a classroom by themselves; they don’t have any children at all. They are by themselves in a big classroom. I think they might be more at risk even being at home because they are with more people. So I have asked Doctor Manzanero to come in and explain because I am not a medical doctor and I don’t want to pretend that I know if they can or can’t contract the virus. But according to Doctor Manzanero, he doesn’t believe that. And so we are meeting with general managers and we invited the union and Doctor Manzanero will be our guest speaker.”