HALIFAX - With daily reported COVID-19 cases still reaching record numbers across the province, Nova Scotia Public Health (NSPH) and the provincial department of Education and Early Childhood Development (EECD) have chosen to add four more days to a holiday break that began on December 17 to head off a surge in a fourth wave sparked by the Omicron variant. 

During the provincial COVID-19 media briefing held on Tuesday, December 28, Education Minister Becky Druhan confirmed that students will return to public schools on January 10, as opposed to the original date of January 6. Nova Scotia's specialized learning centres will re-open as originally slated on January 4, with the exception of centres located in the Chignecto-Central Regional Centre for Education, which will resume classes the following day. 

Druhan and Nova Scotia's Chief Medical Officer of Public Health, Dr. Robert Strang, told media present in the virtual press conference that students and teachers would be provided with three-layer cloth masks upon their return to class next month. Dr. Strang added that the province is hoping to distribute rapid test kits at these schools, pending a delivery of hundreds of thousands of new testing kits by the federal government early in the New Year. 

Responding to a question from Telile Community Television news host/producer Adam Cooke, the Education Minister confirmed that virus-related absences among teachers and other school staffers was the main reason for the early Christmas break that began on December 17, and will likely be a guiding factor in future system-wide shutdowns. 

"The call was made, at that point, for operational reasons - it was made out of concern that we wouldn't have the appropriate staffing," Druhan recalled. 

"And, at that time, things were rapidly changing in terms of the development of the new variant of COVID-19 and the implications for inside the classroom. So, as we return in January to schools, we'll be looking closely at staffing and implementing the various tools that we have in place to support staff and address it as it occurs."

Druhan also pointed out that the presence of the Omicron variant across Nova Scotia makes a province-wide school shutdown and reopening-strategy more practical than addressing the situation in individual health zones, a point confirmed by Dr. Strang. 

"Right now, what we're seeing is that there's COVID-19 across the province, so we're going to take a provincial approach to this," Dr. Strang noted. 

"Maybe, in the weeks to come, as we get to the end of the Omicron wave, we may look at more of a regional approach, and that would be determined. But at this point in time, the reality is that it's throughout the whole province, we have to take a provincial approach."