SCHOOLS ALERT
AS schools re-open next week, pupils and school authorities alike should not be complacent on the imperative need for cleanliness even after cholera has been wiped out.
Quite alright, the rainy season is over but pupils, parents and teachers should bear in mind that diseases are likely to break out in dirty conditions at any time of the year.
The country is just recovering from one of the worst cholera scenarios which caused panic and claimed lives of people, including students that could have otherwise graduated into the productive sectors.
From the onset, pupils and teachers must ensure personal hygiene and a change of mind-set in as far as disposing of dirt is concerned.
Secondly, pupils and their parents must ensure that they neatly seal and preserve food as well as drinks which they usually carry with them for consumption at break and lunch intervals.
Also important is the need to keep school surroundings clean through regular and effective preventive maintenance programmes.
School authorities must ensure that the bathrooms and lavatories are in good working order with a steady supply of running water.
Basic rules must be particularly enforced in boarding schools where pupils from different homes and locations converge to live together the whole term.
Previous inspections in boarding secondary schools, have revealed dysfunctional lavatories and bathrooms.
The kitchens and dining halls are not exactly five-star hotel standard as many of them are in a state of disrepair.
Therefore, particular attention must be on boarding schools!
Perhaps, it will be ideal to maintain the rules that were introduced at the height of the cholera outbreak such as provision of sanitisers and water at entry points while unnecessary handshakes must be minimised.
In short, such rules should be permanent even in the absence of the devastating cholera outbreak.
While cholera and dysentery are common in the rainy season, there are also diseases that can have a telling effect in winter.
Malaria, for instance, is a disease which occurs widely and throughout the year in Zambia.
School authorities, therefore, must ensure that the grass is regularly slashed while all stagnant water must be cleared to keep away mosquitoes that carry the parasite that causes the deadly malaria disease.
The District Education Board Secretaries, Education Standards Oficers and other functionaries must be on the ground regularly and not only when there are serious problems.
In particular, the provincial education officers in all the 10 regions must be on top of issues and ensure that all supervisors and their subordinates are enforcing the rules.
Key among all these officers, are school head teachers who must ensure total adherence.
Schools, particularly at nursery and primary levels, are the best avenues through which best hygienic practices and pleasant mannerisms can be re-enforced.
Pupils come from different backgrounds and surely schools can fill the gaps to pump in the much-needed morals into the children.
Yes, education is the foundation and fulcrum of development in any given circumstances, hence pupils must learn in conducive environment.
A school with unkempt surroundings cannot certainly inspire pupils and teachers to perform to the maximum just like a shabbily-dressed pupil cannot hold self-esteem nor confidence.
A neat and disease-free environment with equally smart-looking pupils and teachers is a reservoir of upto-date knowledge and very fertile for sustainable development.
Parents must thus adequately prepare their children in the remaining few days before schools re-open while teachers must set themselves to inculcate rules of hygiene to the letter.