Bethany School students isolate to protect their health

Our Bethany School in Ethiopia provides children with a fantastic primary education, daily meals, healthcare and family support. Since reopening the school after a period of lockdown, the children have resumed their classes with added measures to reduce the spread of Covid.

Unfortunately Covid cases are increasing in Ethiopia and our Bethany School staff have recently been tested for Covid. From the preliminary test results, there have been some positive cases of Covid amongst the staff at the Bethany School. We felt that these preliminary results were too high to keep the school open while we wait for the remaining results to come back. Therefore, all of our Bethany School children and teaching staff are isolating at home to ensure there is no further spread of the virus.

Due to the lack of availability of Covid tests in Ethiopia, it is not possible to get tests for all of our students and so the best way to keep our staff and children safe at this time is for our staff and children to isolate at home and monitor for symptoms. We are pleased to report that so far, none of our children have experienced any Covid symptoms.

Thankfully our High School students had not been in any contact with the Bethany School staff due to their studies being located at a different site and are therefore able to continue to attend High School as normal.

As our Bethany School children isolate at home, they will no longer be able to receive their daily meals at school. To ensure they do not go hungry, we are providing a food parcels (pictured) for every child isolating. These food parcels are essential to ensuring our children have the nutrition they need to stay healthy and provide security for our children’s families who struggle to afford food each day.  

We are able to provide every child with a food parcel thanks to our amazing supporter’s generosity towards our food appeal. Together we have been able to ensure our children are safe and well as they isolate and provide the lifeline of essential food to families.  

We will continue to monitor the situation very closely to ensure our children are safe and healthy. We hope that after the isolation period finishes, our children can quickly get back to school to receive all the benefits of a great education.