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Preparations for swine flu still under way in schools
Education Minister Nimet Çubukçu recently said they are working in coordination with the Health Ministry on preventive measures against H1N1, popularly known as swine flu, and also on an action plan if the virus spreads.
“But for the time being, it is not spreading, so there is no need to announce any changes in the school calendar, but we are making preparations for temporarily closing schools and postponing or rescheduling the school calendar if it becomes necessary,” she said.
However, Mehmet Bozgeyik from the Education Personnel Union (Eğitim-Sen) told Today's Zaman that teachers had not received in-service training about a possible epidemic.
“Apart from the general knowledge [of health topics] derived from the normal school curriculum, there is no further information supplied to schools and teachers,” he said.
Meanwhile, Dr. Seracceddin Çom, the general director of the Health Ministry's Basic Health Services department, said that they are preparing educational material for schools and hoping to have posters, brochures and short films about swine flu ready by the beginning of November.
According to the Health Ministry's worst case scenario, if measures were not taken and vaccines were not provided in December an epidemic might be break out and possibly reach its peak in February. This scenario estimates that 21 million people would catch the H1N1 virus and 5,300 people would likely die from it in Turkey, costing the economy $1.1 billion in terms of loss of labor and other related costs.
But according to the Health Ministry, if people in the high-risk group are vaccinated against H1N1 and other preventive measures are taken, the number of people who are likely to die from flu complications declines sharply to around 400 people.
In the Health Ministry vaccination program, the first groups who will get shots are first aid workers, security personnel, sufferers of chronic disease, students, pregnant women and Hajj pilgrims, but not teachers, as Bozgeyik of Eğitim-Sen pointed out. “There are almost 700,000 workers in the education sector, but they are excluded from the first groups who will get vaccinations.
They are also at risk,” he said, adding that all education workers, including those in university and pre-school teachers, should be included in the vaccination program immediately.
Bozgeyik added that in the case of an epidemic, although the Education Ministry is talking about rescheduling the school calendar and possibly offering distance learning, these are not possible.
“In Turkey, children who are working in agriculture are not able to finish their yearly education. A comprehensive solution to their problem has not even been found yet, so it will be very difficult to have distance learning in the case of an epidemic,” Bozgeyik said.
Mustafa Oymak, deputy undersecretary of the Education Ministry, told Today's Zaman that regarding the swine flu, the Health Ministry is the institution that implements health policies and decisions should be made by them.
“There is no epidemic; the measures will be varied according to developments, and we are preparing ourselves for it. For the time being, there is no in-service training for teachers yet,” he said.
Foreign schools in Ankara are also taking measures. German Embassy spokesperson Patrick Heinz said the German school has a contingency plan in place should there be an outbreak, but for the time being the school is not implementing further measures.
Ankara's Lycee Français Charles De Gaulle has frequently and regularly informed its students and their parents about swine flu since the beginning of the school year. The lycee also says that in the case of an epidemic, they are ready to offer distance education.
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