Vivienne Clarke
Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO) general secretary John Boyle has said it is time for a review of face masks for primary school children.
His comment follow a suggestion by the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) that the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) should look at the latest evidence on the minimum age for wearing face coverings.
“We are certainly behind a further review,” he told Newstalk’s Breakfast Briefing.
"The last time the review was done was in August 2020 and at that time the people of Ireland were not even being encouraged to wear masks during the pandemic.
“There was a change at that particular time and whatever the public health advice review will say we are happy to go along with it.”
Mr Boyle pointed out that in other countries older children were wearing masks to school, but there were inconsistencies as in Ireland a child aged 12 in a post-primary school wore a mask while a child of the same age in primary or a special school did not.
Teachers were looking forward to the new school year, he added, but warned there remained a sense of trepidation, particularly for colleagues in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy whom he said had been let down badly by the Government by being forced back to work without the protection of the vaccine.
“It is an absolute disgrace that women in their first 14 weeks of pregnancy couldn’t have been left working remotely for a few more weeks until they got the same protection and equality of the rest of the staff,” Mr Boyle said.
