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The Kita-Fachkraft-Verband calls for tests to be compulsory in day-care centers, and the Hessen League Association calls for the state to assume one hundred percent of the costs for the tests and uniform regulations.
Mobile test teams come to some daycare centers in Hessen. In others, such as Offenbach, the city distributes test kits to parents across the board so that they can test their children themselves. And in many other municipalities, children between the ages of zero and six are not tested for the coronavirus at all. A mistake, thinks both the Kita-Fachkraft-Verband and the League Hessen association.
“We need a uniform test strategy,” demands Vera Mengler. The chairwoman of the Kita-Fachkraft-Verband Hessen finds it absolutely incomprehensible why mandatory regular tests in primary schools are considered a central means in combating the pandemic, but are not considered necessary in day-care centers. In Bavaria, Baden-Wuerttemberg and Berlin, daycare children are required to be tested in the new year. “Neither the Delta nor the Omikron variant take federal structures into account,” says Mengler. The association does not consider that the fact that half of the costs for lollipop or spit tests are covered in Hesse is not sufficient. “Thus the safety of the children, families and educators is left to the providers,” criticizes Mengler. Where test material is made available, the responsibility is left to the parents to test their children and thus to ensure the safety of everyone.
Yan Vogel, spokesman for the day care group of the Hessen League, observes a very different practice of child testing in day care centers in Hessen. In contrast to the Kita-Fachkraft-Verband, he is not concerned with compulsory testing, but rather with uniform regulation. “A hundred percent assumption of costs by the state and logistics as in the case of employee testing in practice would bring more security,” says Vogel. “For many independent providers there is a risk if the cost coverage is not clarified or the municipality refuses to take over the other 50 percent.” This does not go far enough for the daycare professional association and it warns against infection of the educators Vaccination and booster. “If they fail due to a corona infection, the system-relevant care for the children for our society is no longer guaranteed,” fears Mengler.
The city of Offenbach will meanwhile distribute a further 100,000 lollipop tests to the day-care centers by the end of February, which they will then pass on to the parents. It is one of the few municipalities that has been offering tests for the youngest nationwide since the end of November. “In the case of indirect contacts in which a group has not yet been quarantined, the Lollitest offer additional security to check whether a transmission has not taken place”, the city explains its approach. As soon as a suspected case is raised or symptoms occur, the parents would also have the opportunity to test their child directly.
Since the introduction of the lollipop, 25 daycare children in Offenbach have tested positive for the corona virus and twelve groups have been quarantined. However, it is no longer possible to differentiate which of these previously had a positive lollipop test or which were revealed by a home test or a test in the test center. A daycare center has not been closed due to too many cases.
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