La Reine Vahwere was giving her children key instructions before sending them back to school in Beni on Tuesday (September 1), urging them to wash their hands, avoid physical contact with classmates and use disinfectant to protect themselves from Ebola.
At the school entrance, staff were standing by with disinfectant, as returning pupils cleaned their hands before heading to classes.
The return to school comes as Democratic Republic of Congo battles its largest Ebola outbreak on record, with more than 6 000 confirmed cases and more than 3 000 deaths reported by September 2.
Beni is located in North Kivu, one of six provinces affected by the outbreak, and health officials have warned that the gathering of children in schools could create additional opportunities for transmission.
Vahwere said both her children and she were worried about the risk of infection, while school director Kasereka Malikidogo Justin said the experience of the previous school year had prompted the school to prepare an infirmary.
“We did not know how to manage them, we did not know how to treat them, since we are not doctors, we are not nurses,” he said of their past experiences.
Children are particularly important to the Ebola response, said president of the country’s Risk Communication and Community Engagement programme Desire Buyana, as they are returning to schools and universities in large numbers.
He added that school leaders and teachers had called for vaccination, saying they would help mobilise parents and communities if a vaccine became available.
For now, schools in Beni are relying on hygiene measures including handwashing, disinfection and monitoring of pupils as the Ebola response continues.
