Central Vietnam province shuts down 37 schools amid Covid-19 surge

The schools, which include kindergartens, primary schools and secondary schools, are mostly located in districts with high and very high coronavirus risks, according to the Ha Tinh Steering Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control.

After the Tet holiday, students in the province began returning to school last Monday. As of Wednesday, 50 teachers and 331 students in the province had tested positive for the novel coronavirus.

Given the increasing number of infections among teachers and students requiring treatment, 37 schools with around 18,348 students have had to suspend all studying activities, both online and offline. They will reopen at a later date depending on the coronavirus situation, authorities said.

Besides the aforementioned schools, 21 others with 13,053 students have had to switch to online classes because of a small number of cases.

Ha Tinh has around 670 schools with 350,000 teachers and students. Students had been allowed to attend in-person classes even before the Tet holiday.

While Ha Tinh is classified as a medium risk province now, the Covid-19 situation may become complicated in the future as a large number of people entered the province during Tet, and some community transmission cases with no obvious infection sources have been detected, authorities said.

Across Vietnam, several localities have observed a rising number of infections among teachers and students after the Tet holiday. However, the Ministry of Education and Training is yet to announce the figures officially.