To­ba­go’s stu­dent vac­ci­na­tion fig­ures are so low, there is now a con­cern that the coun­try would not reach the much-need­ed herd im­mu­ni­ty.

To­ba­go’s Sec­re­tary of the Di­vi­sion of Ed­u­ca­tion, In­no­va­tion and En­er­gy (DEIE), As­sem­bly­man Marslyn Melville-Jack yes­ter­day said of the ap­prox­i­mate­ly 6,000 stu­dents el­i­gi­ble for the Pfiz­er vac­cine, on­ly 1,917 have re­ceived their first dose so far.

Melville-Jack was speak­ing at the Of­fice of the Chief Sec­re­tary Me­dia up­date yes­ter­day and said that on­ly 1,149 stu­dents have re­ceived their sec­ond dose.

Meville-Jack said that there were four con­sul­ta­tions with the stake­hold­ers in­volved in get­ting stu­dents back to school which in­clud­ed the Trinidad and To­ba­go Uni­fied Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) and the Na­tion­al Par­ents Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion.

“Fol­low­ing these con­sul­ta­tions, it was con­clud­ed that schools will phys­i­cal­ly open on Mon­day, Oc­to­ber 4 for ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed stu­dents from forms 4 to 6 to fa­cil­i­tate both teach­ing and prac­ti­cal ses­sions,” she said.

To­ba­go be­gan its ado­les­cent vac­ci­na­tion dri­ve on Au­gust 18 and sec­ond dos­es were ad­min­is­tered in Sep­tem­ber.

“This up­take is way be­low our de­sired re­quire­ment if we are to ap­proach herd im­mu­ni­ty,” she said.

She said that the vac­ci­na­tion dri­ve has been con­tin­u­ing.

“The health and safe­ty of our stu­dents re­main the num­ber one pri­or­i­ty,” she said.

Jack said that the vac­ci­na­tion of­fered chil­dren an ad­di­tion­al lay­er of pro­tec­tion against the COVID-19 virus as To­ba­go pre­pared for face-to-face class­es.

“Over the past 18 months, our stu­dents have ex­pe­ri­enced the dra­mat­ic shift in teach­ing and learn­ing. Many stu­dents have nev­er had the op­por­tu­ni­ty to vis­it their school or even to wear their school uni­forms in pub­lic,” she said.

“Op­er­at­ing in a ful­ly on­line en­vi­ron­ment means that ca­ma­raderie among stu­dents and abil­i­ty to build col­lab­o­ra­tive, so­cial net­works is lost,” she said as she en­cour­aged par­ents and guardians to do what was nec­es­sary to get stu­dents to school safe­ly.

“This is yet an­oth­er ap­peal to en­sure that you and your chil­dren get ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed as soon as pos­si­ble, vac­ci­na­tion is the on­ly way our stu­dents could have the best chance of ful­ly re­turn­ing to face-to-face learn­ing,” Melville-Jack said.