Interim assessment of the Corona study – children must be better protected against viruses – News


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Autumn is here and with it Corona is becoming more and more important. We are spending more time indoors again and this increases the risk of infection. Especially in schools, where the air is often bad. According to the researchers, there is potential for optimization here.

“Not much happens at most schools,” says Ernst Schürch, teacher at the Sissach secondary school and politician, who demanded measures a year ago in the Basel-based cantonal parliament. “School children must be better protected against Corona,” as Schürch says. Since his initiative, pilot tests with air cleaning devices have been carried out in four schools, but the results are still pending.

School children must be better protected against Corona

Science has long warned that school children get infected with Corona much more quickly when the air quality is poor. For this reason, school children should be better protected, says the secondary school teacher. Interim results on the subject were presented at yesterday’s media conference of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).

Better ventilation systems

For Marcel Salathé, the president of the research group in question, the solution is not to take drastic measures. This includes better ventilation systems, which would help improve public health. The basis for this are various studies of the national research program on Corona.

Findings and contributions of Covid-19 research


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A selection of research results were published at yesterday’s SNSF media conference. These include:

  • Wastewater monitoring for pandemic surveillance: Traces of the virus RNA can be detected in the wastewater. Based on good experiences, the monitoring was expanded to over a hundred locations.
  • Protective measures in hospitals conveyed in a playful way: Since the risk of transmission in hospitals is particularly high, a computer game “Escape Covid-19” was developed. The game leads to behavioral changes far more effectively than conventional information material.
  • Vaccinations for immunocompromised checked: According to two long-term studies, the mRNA vaccine is also effective in immunocompromised people. Likewise, antibodies would usually form in people with HIV. This is not the case for many organ transplant recipients.
  • Vaccination by nasal spray: Previous results show an increased formation of antibodies. The vaccine could also protect against new variants.
  • Measure virus concentration in the air: With the help of a developed biosensor, the virus concentration indoors can be continuously monitored.
  • Effect of closing schools and borders: Modeling shows that without the border closure, the number of positive cases would have increased more than twice as much.
  • Science checks itself: Data on SARS-CoV-2 is collected and evaluated worldwide.

With today’s knowledge, one would now have the opportunity to do things better, says Isabella Eckerle. She is a virologist and also involved in a study on corona outbreaks in schools. Exactly these public institutions have it all: “The schools are a very big sticking point.”

The schools are a very big sticking point.

It is very harmful if schools are closed. But if nothing were done at all, this would have equally negative consequences. As a result, there would be many infected children and teachers, which would lead to class cancellations, says Eckerle. According to the results of their study, children play a key role in community transmission.

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Children play a major role in the transmission of infections.

Keystone/Georgios Kefalas

These scientific findings on the corona virus have not yet reached most cantons or municipalities. There – energy crisis or not – there is usually only one recommendation: open the windows and air them out again and again.

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