“Thirty preschools are currently operating under the jurisdiction of the Yerevan municipality that are only meant for the children of working parents,” the head of the Preschool Department of the General Education Department of the Yerevan Municipality, Nune Sargsyan, said during Media Center’s “COVID-19’s entrance is banned, how safe are preschools?” panel. She said that each group in those preschools is composed of a maximum of 12 children. Everyone’s temperature is checked twice per day. Agents frequently come to the preschools for inspection.
Sargsyan said that disposable tableware is used in the preschools. All preschools have been provided with masks and disinfectant products.
The director of Yerevan’s N 50 preschool, Armine Baghdasaryan, said that, for example, the preschool has been open since June 22nd. Each group has 10-12 children, although only 7-8 children from each school are present. The director assured that the preschool has not had any coronavirus cases. “Even the preschool’s playground is frequently disinfected. Outsiders and parents are not allowed to enter the preschool. The windows are always open, and children do not even touch the faucets.” She added that the preschool’s employees are always wearing masks that they change every 3-4 hours. They also are provided with disinfectant materials.
The director of the Noyemberyan N 2 preschool, Parandzem Khangeldyan, said that she will invite local epidemiologists to inspect the preschool and ensure that everything is fine before it opens on September 14th. She added that the preschool directors have all met with the community leader to discuss the situation. “We do not have sufficient resources to purchase disposable masks. We made some calculations and found that we need 700 masks for 15 days so that employees can change their masks every 3 hours. We are thinking about washing the masks so we can reuse them because no community has enough resources. It is even possible that we won’t be able to have hand sanitizer and other disinfectant materials.”
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Hepatologist at the NORK Clinical Hospital of infectious Diseases, Hasmik Ghazinyan, said that it is unacceptable to wash disposable masks and reuse them. “In that case, it is better to use cloth masks than to use disposable masks several times. I think they are required to provide you with masks. Every employee needs to have at least two masks every day,” the doctor said.
Gohar Hakobyan
