A growing number of provinces have delayed the full return to classrooms in January to allow public health officials to assess the impact of the Omicron variant and prevent a potential surge in cases fuelled by school children.
So far, half of the country’s provinces have made changes to the January schedule as case numbers rise in record-setting fashion across the country.
“If you open schools up on January 3rd, the number of cases we have is likely to result very quickly in a large number of transmission events between students, between teachers,” Dr. Alon Vaisman, infectious disease expert at Toronto’s University Health Network, told CTV National News.
“We just have a wave surging at the wrong time."
Ontario announced on Thursday that the return of school will be pushed back to Jan. 5. Only low-contact indoor sports and safe extra-curricular activities will be permitted when students return.
The province says the two-day delay will allow time to deploy addition safety measures. This includes acquiring 3,000 HEPA filter units for school boards as well as free high-quality three-ply masks for students. Staff at schools and daycares will also be provided with non-fit-tested N95 masks.
Quebec had initially pushed back school reopening to Jan. 10. However, the province announced on Thursday -- alongside other sweeping COVID-19 health measures -- that school closures would remain until Jan. 17.
The winter break for Alberta students is being extended to Jan. 10, the province announced on Thursday. Alberta is also cancelling diploma exams for high school students, which were set to start on Jan. 11.
On Wednesday, B.C. also said it will delay the return to in-person learning in an effort to give school staff time to implement enhanced safety measures.
Education Minister Jennifer Whiteside said staff and students whose parents are health workers, as well as those who need extra support, will return to schools Jan. 3 or 4. All other students will return to classrooms Jan. 10.
When students do return, they’ll face additional enhanced safety measures, including a pause on extracurricular sports tournaments, and staggered recess and break times. School gatherings like assemblies and staff meetings will be held virtually.
Newfoundland and Labrador made a similar announcement Wednesday, announcing a return to remote learning starting Jan. 4. According to Premier Andrew Furey, the decision will be re-evaluated on a weekly basis in order to return students to in-person classes as soon as possible.
In Nova Scotia, the holiday break has been extended in order to allow families to monitor students for COVID-19 symptoms before they return to in-person classes. Classes will now resume for students on Monday, Jan. 10, while teachers and other school staff will return on Tuesday, Jan. 4.
Schools in the province will also enforce enhanced public health measures, like strict cohorting between classrooms, the cancellation of assemblies and gatherings, and a ban on non-essential visitors.
Manitoba and P.E.I. were among the first to announce delays to in-person schools due to the rapid spread of Omicron. In both provinces, in-person learning has been delayed until at least Jan. 10 to give public health officials more time to assess the risks of Omicron.
Meanwhile, both experts and parents remain divided on the issue. While some say a delay in in-person learning may give time for eligible children to get vaccinated or to monitor for post-holiday infections, others say closures will do more harm than good.
“With school closures, you have to ask yourself what the endpoint is—if you do close schools for another week, what can you meaningfully achieve during that time,” Dr. Fahad Razak, a member of the Ontario Science Advisory Table told CTV National News.
“I would say the most important opportunity is vaccination - so if that decision is made there has to be also simultaneously a plan to say these are the concrete steps we are going to take to make sure more kids are vaccinated because we know school closures overall can cause harm. They are not a major mechanism of spread, at least yet.”
- With files from The Canadian Press and CTVNews.ca's Tom Yun
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