Madrid cancels Covid tests for teachers after huge crowds attend

THE first day of serological tests for teachers in the Community of Madrid has generated crowds and queues of up to three hours at the doors of the IES Virgen la Paloma centre in Madrid.

The mass attendance at one of the six centres authorised by the regional government has forced the Ministry of Education to postpone the tests for teachers until this Friday.
“Due to saturation in the management of the performance of the tests, today’s call is suspended and communication will soon be received with a call for Friday,” the Ministry of Education informed the management of the centre in an internal communication.

The tests in this centre were scheduled to take place from 8am to 2.30pm, however, by 3pm the situation was in no way under control, with a queue stretching more than a kilometre long.
“It is a shame. If we were not infected, it is likely that we are now,” said one of the teachers who attended this Wednesday to check if she has antibodies before the return to school.
Those who do show immunity will have to undergo a second test, this time, a PCR.

The teachers point out that they were notified with very little time to spare, since information was received between Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning, some even first thing in the morning.
“The organisation has been disastrous,” said one of the teachers affected.

The Comunidad de Madrid defended themselves by saying that it has been a “specific” problem that has not occurred in the other six centres where the tests were being carried out and, according to the vice president of the regional government, Ignacio Aguado, the problems detected will be resolved “in the next few days.”

For her part, the Deputy Minister of Educational Organisation, Pilar Ponce, has declared that the waits at IES Virgen de la Paloma happened because the teachers did not come at the time they were summoned. For this reason, she has asked that people be “very responsible” and try to go in the time slot in which they have been allocated, taking into account that in the capital up to 10,000 tests for teachers have been arranged per day.

Thank you for reading “Madrid cancels Covid tests for teachers after huge crowds attend”, you may also enjoy “Teachers Unhappy with Government’s Decision to Reopen Schools”