Coronavirus in China: some PE tests scrapped for high school entrance exams
- After latest Covid wave, Shanghai is first major city to suspend physical education tests for children
- Parents, teachers worried about stress on health of pupils recently infected with Covid
Public health experts have estimated that 80 per cent of the population had been infected since the restrictions were eased.
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Last month Shi Zheng, a deputy in the Shanghai People’s Congress, said she advised that the test be cancelled because strenuous exercise would not be suitable for students still recovering from infections, according to a report by local news portal The Paper.
On Tuesday, the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission announced that the PE test would be suspended this year and that all students would receive a full score for that portion of the entrance exam.
Similar concerns had been raised by parents elsewhere in the country.
After three years of Covid-19 – and government restrictions to control it – students have lacked a structured study routine as well as regular physical exercise.
“Most students were infected and would put their health at risk if they trained for the test,” parent Jiang Zhenhai wrote on the government website.
Other cities have scrapped the cardio-intensive portions of the physical tests, which can vary by city.
The cities of Suzhou and Yangzhou in Jiangsu province suspended their mandatory 1,000-metre (3,020-feet) runs for boys and 800-metre runs for girls. Wuxi also called off its 50-metre swimming tests.
“I support Shanghai and other cities’ decisions to suspend the PE test,” said a teacher surnamed Tang from a high school in Beijing. Requiring students who were recently infected with Covid to take PE tests could be “dangerous”, he added.
“It is risky for parents and schools too. No one wants to risk [students’ health and life] for this,” Tang said.
The National Health Commission said last month that new rules would be put into place to monitor the health of students once classes resumed for the first time since students were sent home last November.
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“While children tend to recover faster than adults do, there are some cases where children can continue to feel symptoms more than six months later,” said Carlos Oliveira, a specialist in paediatric infectious diseases at the Yale School of Medicine, in a video posted on the website for the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund earlier this month.
Oliveira suggested that parents be mindful of the stress on children after Covid, and watch out for cardiac symptoms, such as children who report feeling faster heartbeats even after minimal activity.