Six universities demand students wear masks on campus

Written by The Daily Mail on August 23, 2021. Posted in Current News

Six universities are demanding students continue to wear masks on campus in September despite social distancing measures being removed.

London Metropolitan University, University College London (UCL), and the universities of East London, Bolton, Glasgow, Greenwich (pictured) and Birmingham City say face coverings will be mandatory for students when they arrive on the campus for the new academic year.

A total of 65 universities say they will be ‘encouraging‘ or ‘requesting‘ students to wear masks on campus in the autumn term, according to the Times Higher Education (THE) guide.

The Government scrapped rules for mandatory face mask wearing in public as part of its July 19 ‘Freedom Day’ changes.

However, it recommends people wear a face covering in crowded and enclosed spaces, and organisations such as Transport for London (TfL) have continued to make masks mandatory. 

London Metropolitan University, in north London, said it would make masks mandatory for staff and students moving around buildings.

It told THE that its decision  reflected its significant number of black, Asian and ethnic minority students, ‘groups that have been disproportionately affected by the Covid pandemic‘.

UCL said staff, students and visitors would be expected to wear a mask in all areas of the campus ‘unless you are alone in a room‘.

The University of East London said it was asking students to commit to wearing a mask in enclosed and crowded spaces.

Bolton, Glasgow and Birmingham City universities all told THE that masks would be mandatory on campus. 

However, Glasgow and Birmingham City specified that this only applied when moving around campus, rather than when seated.

Meanwhile, Imperial College London said it expects staff and students to wear masks in indoor settings when working ‘within two metres‘ of one another.

The University of Greenwich said: `Our expectation and strong recommendation is that face coverings should continue to be worn inside our buildings. This is consistent with the government’s recommendation that face coverings should be worn in crowded indoor spaces. There are some exceptions which are set out in our guidance, for example you can remove your face covering when seated at a workstation and you are 2m or more away from other people.‘

It comes as the University and College Union (UCU) last month wrote to education secretary Gavin Williamson demanding the full vaccination of all students by September.

The union, which represents over 120,000 academics and support staff, also demanded compulsory face masks on campus to stop the Delta variant from ripping through universities in the new academic year.

The letter to the education secretary, seen by the Guardian, said: ‘Last year, ministers green-lit the mass movement of students across the country and failed to recognise the effect this would have on infections, on those working and studying in the sector, and on the wider communities of which they become a part. As the Westminster government removes all restrictions and the associated public health guidance, there is a real danger that unless we learn key lessons from last year, our education settings become incubators for Covid-19 all over again.‘

Currently all 18-year-olds in the UK are entitled to a Covid jab as part of the Government’s vaccine roll-out.

However, the UCU say students and prospective students should be treated as a priority group to ensure they are fully vaccinated in time for the start of term.

It comes as today, in a blow to calls to rush through vaccinations for students, a major study found that double-jabbed people who catch the Indian variant are just as likely to develop symptoms and spread Covid as the unvaccinated.

The Oxford University research suggests herd immunity is ‘unachievable‘ because vaccines do not significantly reduce transmission of the virus.

Although fully vaccinated people are significantly less likely to be infected, those who do get Covid have a similar peak ‘viral load’ as the unvaccinated.

This means infected people ‘shed’ the same amount of virus when they cough or sneeze, regardless of whether or not they have been jabbed.

Experts said the findings strengthened the argument for a ‘booster’ Covid jab programme this autumn. However, the study stressed that two doses remain remarkably effective at preventing death and hospitalisation.

And even though the viral load may peak at similar levels in the vaccinated and unvaccinated, scientists say it’s possible jabbed people clear the infection quicker.

It follows similar findings by Public Health England and the US’ Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which earlier this month released figures showing unvaccinated and double-jabbed have very similar viral loads.

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