Call for teachers to be placed on the vaccine priority list
TEACHERS in Wales should be placed on the vaccination priority list, a group of Carmarthenshire councillors have said.
They are asking the council’s executive board to formally consider their recommendation, and to lobby the Welsh Government.
Members of the education and scrutiny committee agreed the move, proposed by councillor Jean Lewis, after hearing about the challenges faced by teachers during the coronavirus pandemic.
Her proposal was that teachers should be fifth on the UKwide priority list behind residents in a care home for older adults and their carers, people aged 80 and over and frontline health and social care workers, people aged 75 and over, and those aged 70 years and over and clinically extremely vulnerable individuals.
There are currently nine groups on the priority list, but teachers are not on it.
Teaching unions in Wales also want this to change.
The scrutiny committee was told that the proportion of teaching staff who had contracted Covid in Carmarthenshire was very low.
Executive board member for education and children, councillor Glynog Davies, said he also thought teaching staff should get the jab, but not before vulnerable people.
The meeting on January 6 heard about different types of support for head teachers and teachers.
Aeron Rees, head of curriculum and wellbeing, said parents saw head teachers as “pillars of authority” and turned to them for advice on mat
If we move any particular occupational group further up the list that means we de-prioritise another group of people Health Minister Vaughan Gething
ters unrelated tion.
Councillor Kim Broom welcomed the support options available, including a Welsh Governmentbacked helpline offered by the charity Education Support, but wanted to know if remote one-toone sessions were available.
She said: “We can bombard teachers and head
to
educa
teachers with emails and information. How much individual support are we offering senior leaders in delivering what we expect?”
Mr Rees cited the support measures in the report, and added that head teachers also turned to partners, friends and others outside the profession.
“That’s true of all of us, I suppose,” he said.
Last week, Health Minister Vaughan Gething was asked about vaccinating teachers at a briefing.
He said: “If we move any particular occupational group further up the list that means we de-prioritise another group of people.”
But he said the situation could change if evidence of risk changed.
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