Despite the explosion in COVID-19 cases, Quebec is staying the course on returning to class on January 17 for preschool, elementary and secondary students. The government plans to distribute more than 7 million self-tests to preschool and elementary school students for home use in January and early February. School personnel will be added to those eligible for PCR tests.
Another novelty is that school staff will now have access to rapid tests in schools, in addition to students.
The isolation period for students aged 12 and over and staff members will be reduced from 10 days to 5 days for vaccinated people who do not have symptoms.
Quebec, however, gives up offering N95 masks to teachers. The Minister of Education, Jean-François Roberge, requested an opinion from Public Health on the matter, but the National Director of Public Health, Dr Horacio Arruda, spoke out against the suggestion.
Quebec indicates that it has provided an air exchanger to all the schools that requested it; 400 of these devices have been distributed. As for the CO2 readers, 50,000 of these devices (out of 90,000) were provided.
Further details will follow
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