Two adolescents were vaccinated against covid-19 at the Nurse Isabel Zendal hospital in Madrid, last Wednesday.Chema Moya / EFE
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Coronavirus restrictions to remain in Spanish schools, with half of high school students due to be vaccinated
The 2021-2022 academic year, the third to be hit by the pandemic, will begin this September with about half of the 12 to 18-year-old students vaccinated against the coronavirus and with a good part of the rest with the first puncture received. Between the 6th (in La Rioja) and the 15th (in Galicia, Castilla y León, and Andalusia), more than 3.1 million students of Compulsory Secondary Education (ESO), High School and Professional Training (FP) of Middle Grade They will resume academic activity in an environment very different from that of a year ago —when vaccines were still in the research phase, while now there are more than 30 million Spaniards with the complete guideline—, but without too many practical changes in the day-to-day .
Central government and communities meet this Wednesday to discuss and review the plans agreed last May for the next academic year, which provide for the maintenance of a large part of the protection measures (such as the mask for those over six years of age), although some will go back to pre-pandemic times, such as student-to-class ratios.
Plans that now the threat of the delta variant, more contagious, may force to change, although experts are confident that they are enough to repeat the success of last year, in which Spain managed to keep the classrooms open.
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“My advice would be that all colleges and institutes do more or less the same as last year. It is still too early to lift measures such as masks and physical distance. We have a too high circulation of the virus and although the current percentages will help, it will be necessary to have almost the entire population between 12 and 19 years vaccinated and a lower incidence before relaxing them, ”explains Santiago Moreno, head of infectious diseases at Hospital Ramón y Cajal (Madrid).
Elena Vanessa Martínez, president of the Spanish Epidemiology Society (SEE), highlights that the good management carried out by educational centers a year ago should be maintained this course. “It was something admirable, they gave us all a lesson. Schools and institutes showed us that if things are done well, the results are good. Now we have a more contagious variant, but it spreads in the same way. So if the same measures are applied, the virus will continue to be unable to circulate in schools ", summarizes Martínez, who despite everything regrets that it" returns to the ratios by class prior to the pandemic. "
According to the latest report from the Ministry of Health, corresponding to this Friday, 55.4% of the 3.9 million citizens between the ages of 12 and 19 have already received the first dose of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. The separation between punctures of the first is 21 days and the second, 28, so the forecast - some adolescents of this age have already left their studies - is that about half will have completed the pattern when they return to the classroom or do it on their first days of class. Among the rest, many will have received the first puncture, which from the tenth day begins to give partial protection.
The higher will be the percentage —although it is not possible to estimate precise data— of immunized among the nearly two million university and VET students, over 18 years of age. Although the age groups between the training cycles and those included in the vaccination strategy do not coincide, the twenty-somethings who have already received the first dose (and will have the complete schedule with the return to the classrooms) this Friday exceeded 69%.
There is no vaccine approved yet for children under 12 years of age, an age that coincides with the infant and primary cycles (almost 4.5 million students). "Children between six and 12 must for now maintain measures such as a mask to prevent the virus from circulating among them and from being able to transmit it to the most vulnerable. Although most of their parents and grandparents are already vaccinated, there are important population groups that still need to be protected. They are the immunosuppressed and the 5% of people who do not develop immunity despite having received the vaccine ”, explains Santiago Moreno.
The head of infectious diseases at the Ramón y Cajal Hospital gives as an example the patients admitted to his center: “About half are people who had received both doses, 20% only one and 30% had not yet been vaccinated. It is not that vaccines are not working, on the contrary, they have saved thousands of lives. But with the current high incidence, if to the 5% to which the vaccine has not protected you add the immunosuppressed and those who have not yet received the complete guideline, there are many people who are still vulnerable ”, adds this expert.
José Luis Barranco, spokesman for the Spanish Society of Preventive Medicine, Public Health and Hygiene (SEMPSPH) recalls that “every time it has been thought that the virus had gained ground and measures have been relaxed, it has responded with a new wave contagion ”. Despite this, this specialist is optimistic: “We have the experience of the previous year, where there were very few infections and outbreaks, which shows us that things were done well. It is true that the delta variant is more contagious, but I hope that if things are done in the same way, the levels of circulation of the virus in educational centers will be controlled ”.
No specialist dares to make a forecast about when they will be able to say goodbye to prevention measures and masks. First, they coincide, it will be necessary to see how the start of the course is going and from there to make decisions according to the data that arise inside and outside the classrooms.
The educational community started last year with uncertainty, since the more than eight million schoolchildren had not been found in the classrooms since mid-March and had to live in confined spaces. The Ministries of Health and Education - coordinated with the autonomies - established a very strict protocol that forced fewer students to gather in class to maintain distances - more teachers were hired - to air at all hours, to wear a mask for those over six years and confine the entire class (in the majority of autonomies) when a positive was detected in a bubble group. And the formula worked.
In Europe, only Sweden and Spain managed, thanks to their extreme prevention measures, to keep classrooms open. The then Minister Isabel Celaá was proud at the end of last year: "Spain has the honor of having only been with a maximum of 2% of the classrooms in quarantine in the worst moments". Experts consulted at the time by this newspaper included in the list of reasons for success a benign climate, which allowed keeping the windows open, and the social consensus around the importance of face-to-face teaching.
Next Wednesday Pilar Alegría, Minister of Education and Vocational Training, will meet with the regional councilors of the field at the Education Sector Conference with the “objective, reiterated on numerous occasions by the minister, that attendance is full at all stages and educational levels ”, according to the announcement. Last year, many over 12s alternated classes in the classroom and at home. A third of the high school graduates studied like this.
Last May, Minister Manuel Castells, who will meet with the rectors and councilors before the academic year begins, advanced the plans of the Ministry of Universities: “Next year the course depends on the delta variant and social discipline . The idea is that it be present with the precautionary measures that we have, because we are not going to abandon the mask, the windows are going to open, there will be physical distance ... The pandemic has not ended ”. The face-to-face campuses welcomed 1.3 million students.
In the 2020-2021 academic year, there was blended attendance - with great differences between deans, with groups that only went to campus for practices or on alternate days - and a small initial scare foreshadowed the worst.
An outbreak with 168 infections after an Ibizan party in a residence hall forced classes to be suspended for a few days at the Polytechnic of Valencia (20,000 students).
But finally, although there have been large pockets of infections in university residences, there were no outbreaks on campuses.
With information from
Elisa Silió.