TDP Urges AP CM To Close All Schools

TDP General Secretary Nara Lokesh today urged Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Jaganmohan Reddy to close all schools to prevent the rising coronavirus threat to lakhs of children in the State.

Lokesh wrote a letter to the Chief Minister stressing the need for strong preventive measures since most school students were yet to be vaccinated.

Expressing serious concern, Lokesh said, "I bring to your urgent notice the need to shut down schools in Andhra Pradesh in view of rising Covid-19 cases these past two weeks across India and in the state. Our neighbouring states Telangana and Tamil Nadu have already passed orders closing schools and physical classes till the end of January. Kerala has also closed its schools for two weeks starting January 21."

"It is imperative that we do not willingly expose these students to any kind of risk," Lokesh said, adding that even though fatality rates among children were extremely low, the same could not be said for the elders in their households.

"This was also the same basis on which I urged your government to cancel the board exams last year during the second wave of Covid-19. We must not allow our students, most of whom are unvaccinated, to become the victims of a third wave now," he said.

The TDP MLC pointed out that in the past 10 days new cases recorded in AP had ballooned from 500 to 5,000 per day, and that the state's positivity rate had also gone past 10%.

"It would be callous of the government to resume classes for students now, with no precautions taken or vaccinations done for most of the students," he said.