While the government plans to relax Covid-19 standard operating procedures (SOPs) for those fully vaccinated, those with young children remain anxious about the safety of their offspring.
This was the crux of Twentytwo13’s managing editor Pearl Lee’s column in Malay news portal Getaran this week.
Pearl shared that her little one often asks when will the world return to normal. He would often express his desire to attend football training, go to the bookshops and savour ice cream at his favourite cafe.
However, all she can do is to tell her son that it’s not safe to go out as the number of cases was still high.
But without a vaccine for those under 12, Pearl said the lives of our young are going to be severely impacted.
“It’s not just the lack of physical activities, but the social development of children has been affected as they are not interacting with their peers,” Pearl wrote.
“Although online learning provides protection against Covid-19, it does not provide children with the hands-on learning experience that they need.”
Children who started school after the pandemic began are unable to exchange views, motivate each other, or joke with their friends.
The number of Covid-19 cases is also increasing among children. In Kelantan, the number of babies and children aged between 28 days and 12 years infected with Covid-19, increased between 25 and 30 per cent in the last two weeks.
Pearl also noted that in May, it was reported that 48,261 children in the country had been infected, with 6,290 of them, aged 18 months and below.
Our little ones, she said, have also been severely impacted by the deaths of their loved ones from Covid-19.
She noted a study by the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention’s Covid-19 Response Team, which found that an estimated 1.5 million children around the world had lost parents or grandparents to Covid-19.
“New variants of the virus, including Lambda, which was reported overseas, is also worrying as experts have said that this variant had shown resistance to the vaccines in labs,” she added.
As such, while some may rejoice that SOPs may be relaxed for those who had been vaccinated, as a mother of a young child, Pearl said it was still disconcerting.
“Adults with young children at home must double their efforts in protecting their loved ones in their bid to strike a fine balance between protecting lives and livelihood,” she added.
To read the column, visit www.getaran.my.
