- In view of the “protocol errors”, the public school Judimendi of Vitoria-Gasteiz decided on its own to preventively send home half of the twelve classrooms it has, because from Osakidetza they told them that “the classrooms did not need a follow-up of the contacts, although there were two and three confirmed positive cases in each class”. The center says that a situation that could be much more serious has been avoided, with at least 22 positive confirmed in the last week and finally the center has been closed. It's the only center of the CAV that's totally closed right now.
“We can’t close school because Osakidetza doesn’t do her job well”
The Faculty of Judimensiondi has denounced that “the lack of a rapid and adequate analysis of the first cases” has ultimately attributed to them the situation: “Day after day we saw that the contagion went up and we felt helpless, with many walls to cope with the situation. Finally, we have called for mass screening for all centers in view of the seriousness of the situation. We can’t close school because Osakidetza doesn’t do her job well.”
They criticise the fact that the protocol has not been updated since October and that the centres have not been consulted on its effectiveness. In their case, they consider that the lack of preventive containment is a protocol failure, as it could have been contaminated by direct contacts without follow-up in the classrooms.
Lack of communication
Communication is not good, they have warned: “There is no direct telephone contact with Osakidetza to be able to communicate quickly and update cases.” They report that the communication between Osakidetza and the center is not fluid. “What’s more, the center is not informed about the outcome of direct contacts.”
In addition, “there is no training or advice for the center’s COVID-19 coordinators.”
Judimendi welcomes about 180 students of Early Childhood and Primary Education and the characteristics of the center itself have not facilitated the situation: there are many families with more than one child in the center and with frequent communication difficulties (among others, the existence of large families without technological means).