Ministry sends strong mask message to schools

The Government has issued a strongly worded “recommendation” to schools to enforce mask-wearing for the first four weeks of Term 3.

But it’s stopped short of making masks compulsory nationally, instead leaving it to each school to decide for itself.

That stronger wording comes as the Omicron wave appears to have reached a peak of just over 10,000 daily cases. Covid has killed or hastened the deaths of at least 1252 people in New Zealand, most of them this year.

Daily cases have now dipped below 10,000, but it’s unclear how much the school holidays have slowed transmission — and whether cases will rise again when students return to the classroom.

Associate Education Minister Jan Tinetti has written to school boards, outlining the Government’s “strong recommendation to review and enforce a mask-wearing policy as much as practicable”, according to a bulletin sent to schools Wednesday night.

It said both the Education and Health Ministries were recommending students Year 4 and up should wear masks for the next four weeks, while indoors, where practical and where it won’t have a “significant impact on teaching and learning”.

That follows Dr Ashley Bloomfield’s “strong recommendation” earlier this week that schools bring back maskwearing from Monday.

Schools that had put in place simple measures like maskwearing were the ones who had been able to minimise infection, he said.

But when questioned on whether the Government should require schools to enforce masking, he said the Ministry of Health had been asked for that advice and had settled on the “very strong recommendation” message.

Under the red light setting, masks were compulsory in schools for Years 4 and up, but since the move to orange in April each school board has set its own mask policy.

That’s despite strong criticism from public health experts.

The move meant some schools enforced masks while others made them optional or “encouraged” — despite winter illnesses causing staff shortages and student absences that forced many schools to return to hybrid or online learning.

The ministry would later advise whether masking policies should be extended beyond the first four weeks of term.