THE SCHOOLS Division of Iloilo recorded 18 cases of COVID-19 – nine teachers, two non-teaching personnel and seven students. As of Oct. 10, 10 of these patients have recovered.
How did these patients get the virus? By delivering learning modules? We do not know for sure.
What’s certain is this – these cases stress the need for the Department of Education (DepEd) to conduct health screening and widespread testing among education workers. They also put the spotlight on the inadequate funding for COVID-19 preventive measures in the education sector.
And oh, if we may ask, what has DepEd done to help teachers who got sick of COVID-19? What kind of support can teachers expect if they do contract this coronavirus?
Amid the pandemic, DepEd should ensure that healthcare services – free, if possible – are available for teachers as they push for the continuity of classes. Teachers are frontliners in the delivery of education for the youth. Now more than ever, DepEd must ensure that their rights under the Magna Carta for Public School Teachers and other pertinent laws on occupational health are realized.
As long as the precautionary measures in schools are not enough and as long as the government continues to deny the Filipino people the need for mass testing, teachers, students and their families are vulnerable to contracting COVID-19 and an even worse outbreak will ensue.
It is high time that DepEd ensure public school teachers free compulsory medical examination, at least once a year, and, if it’s not too much to ask, free medical treatment and/or hospitalization.
In the proposed 2021 national budget, funding for the P500 medical check-up allowance for teachers was scrapped and benefits under the Magna Carta for Public School Teachers remain unfunded. This has to change especially amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Seven months into the longest lockdown in the world, people are still waiting for concrete and systematic medical solutions such as widespread testing, contact tracing, adequate isolation and quarantine facilities and protection for our healthcare workers. Congress should focus on how it is able to allocate adequate funds to ensure that teachers will not have to worry about the expenses in case they are exposed to COVID-19.
The health of teachers and non-teaching personnel must not be neglected and sacrificed for education continuity.
