Rochelle Walensky, who has been nominated to serve as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, speaks after US President-elect Joe Biden announced his team tasked with combating the Covid-19 pandemic at The Queen in Wilmington, Delaware on December 8. , 2020.
Jim Watson | AFP | Getty Images
Teachers do not need to be vaccinated against Covid-19 before schools can reopen safely, the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday.
“There is growing data to suggest that schools can reopen safely and that safe reopening does not suggest that teachers should be vaccinated,” CDC director Rochelle Walensky told reporters at a White House press conference on Covid-19.
“Teacher vaccinations are not a prerequisite for safe reopening of schools,” she added.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices voted to place “essential primary care workers”, including teachers, next in line to receive a Covid-19 vaccine, after first prioritizing health workers and residents of long-term care facilities. However, it may take a while for most teachers to get their injection, as US officials are working to speed up the vaccination rate.
Still, US school systems are under pressure to reopen after switching to distance learning last year as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, which infected more than 26.4 million Americans and at least 447,077 people in just over a year. killed.
Some parents have been forced to stay at home to look after their children instead of going to work. Meanwhile, teachers and other teachers have raised concerns about returning to school, potentially putting their health at risk.
A CDC study published late last month found little evidence of the virus spreading in schools in the US and abroad when precautions were taken, such as wearing masks, social distancing, and ventilating rooms.
The Biden government has released a rescue plan for Covid that provides for $ 170 billion in schools and universities to reopen. Part of the money would be used to scale up testing. The government has said testing is a “crucial” strategy to control the spread of the virus, but additional tests are still not widely available, and the US is still not using the tests effectively.
Walensky has previously said that during the pandemic, schools should be the first to open and the last to close.
Jeff Zients, President Joe Biden’s Covid-19 czar, said on Wednesday that Biden has been “very clear” that he wants schools to “reopen and remain open.”
“That means every school has the equipment and the means to open it safely,” he said at the press conference, urging Congress to “do its part” by approving Biden’s Covid bailout. “Not just private schools or schools in affluent areas, but all schools.”