Report kids having Covid symptoms for two straight days: BBMP to schools

The BBMP has directed all city schools to report students developing Covid symptoms for two consecutive days.

The civic body’s directions are based on the recommendation of its paediatric expert committee. The committee, which held its meeting on Wednesday, recommended to the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) to monitor the kids’ health.

“Schools must appoint a nodal officer who will inform the nearest primary health centre (PHC) about the student exhibiting Covid symptoms for more than two days. Such students will be discouraged from attending classes and reported to health officials,” BBMP’s Chief Commissioner Gaurav Gupta said.

The BBMP’s health team will ensure the children and their parents are quarantined, tested and treated for the epidemic, Gupta added. The BBMP will also vaccinate everyone interacting closely with symptomatic children.

“All persons who may possibly come in contact with school-going kids, including the teaching and non-teaching staff at schools, shall be vaccinated on priority,” Gupta said.

While the civic body is cautious about the outbreak of the third Covid wave, officials revealed that the infection rate among children is still low. “It’s only 7.2% among children aged between 0 and 12 years and 8.21% those between 13 and 18 years,” said a health official.

The paediatric experts also reportedly reviewed the genome sequencing of Covid-positive children during the meeting. “No new strains were found during genome sequencing results of the children. Only Delta lineages were observed,” said BBMP Special Commissioner (Health) D Randeep.

Flu vaccine must for kids

Amid rising cases of seasonal flu and viral fever across Bengaluru, the experts’ committee also said flu vaccination in children could be useful during the ongoing pandemic. “The committee recommended that flu vaccines for children could be helpful and suggested that the government mandate it. We will convey this to the government for the final decision,” Randeep said.

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