School in Italy will be closed starting today
As growing concerns over the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak continue to trouble citizens and public officials, Italy’s minister of education Lucia Azzolina announced on Wednesday that all public schools and universities will close from March 5 to March 15.
Some Italian schools have already been closed in certain regions where the virus has heavily impacted the community. To work around the closing, schools have adapted new online tools to help keep classes going. However, it is unclear whether the remote online classes will continue countrywide. Currently, there is no national system of online education.
#COVID19 : #China 🇨🇳 sending protective Masks and Medical Equip in #Italy 🇮🇹. pic.twitter.com/MQdu5xMHTj
— TGWIMPFFEN (@tgwimpffen) March 5, 2020
A little over 2,500 cases of coronavirus have been reported in the country and 79 people have died so far. Italy will be taking further measures to limit the spread of the virus. The government has issued the cancellation of any event where there will be a high “concentration of people.”
Prior to Italy’s announcement of school closures, Japan announced that it would suspend all classes until early April. China also closed all schools until the virus is no longer a public health emergency. U.S. universities have canceled and called back American students studying abroad in Italy, and some schools have even canceled their study abroad programs to the infected countries.
By: Maytinee Kramer