BOLOGNA. For the safe return to the desks, the serological tests arrive at teachers, educators and janitors, from nurseries to high schools: 87 thousand, the Region estimates. In fact, a mass screening as has already been seen in healthcare. Exams that can be done from next Monday to 7 September, up to a week before returning to class.
The race against time for the reopening of schools also passes through the guarantees for workers: teachers, mostly over 50, do not hide the fear of contagion by going back to the chair, a fear that also runs among teachers and educators of kindergartens and maternal, where distancing with children is not prescribed for obvious reasons. Free serological tests, therefore, on a voluntary basis, entrusted to family doctors. To do so, you can contact them directly or call the toll-free number of the Region reserved for the Coronavirus emergency (800033033). If the test is positive, the teacher will be subjected to the swab no later than 48 hours from the outcome of the first exam.
It is the Ministry of Health that has defined the steps with a decree of 7 August. Now it’s up to general practitioners to perform them on request. From the top of the regional school comes the invitation not to shy away: «It has a value not only for the protection of personal health – observes the director Stefano Versari – but undergoing the test also assumes a strong social relevance because it allows mass screening up to now carried out only for health personnel. I sincerely hope that it will be done, while respecting the free decision ». If everyone were to request the test – not all kits will be available from Monday – there would be an average of 5,800 tests per day in the region. In Bologna the estimate is an average of about thirty serological tests per family doctor.
«The decision to entrust them to us is right, we are more widespread in the area, more recognized by our patients» comments Maurizio Camanzi of the Fimmg of Bologna. “We have agreed to participate in the tests for free, we are in an emergency and no doctor can back down in the face of the need to restart a service such as school – continues the representative of the union of general practitioners – and then do prevention in view of an uncertain autumn is a good thing. We will urge colleagues to join ”. The prospect is to continue performing serological tests on a regular basis to school staff. All to avert the great fear: a new suspension of lessons.
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