A return to remote learning as second wave intensifies

Public and private Egyptian universities have suspended face-to-face education and postponed first-term exams until after the mid-year break as the country continues to experience a second wave of COVID-19 infections.

The decision was approved a week ago, at the end of 2020, during a virtual meeting of the Supreme Council of Universities.

The decision provides for the completion of the remaining classes in the first semester of the current academic year, which ends on 16 January, through e-learning platforms. The mid-year break will start on 20 February. All oral and practical first-term examinations on undergraduate and postgraduate level will take place after the recess. In addition, all other activities such as conferences and festivals will be suspended.

A source within the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research, quoted by Masrawy newspaper, said exams could be postponed until the end of the academic year if the coronavirus crisis continues.

Furthermore, the number of employees on campuses should be limited without disrupting work performance.

The council’s decision is in line with the government’s strategy to mitigate the impact of the spread of the coronavirus and to enhance the health and safety of all members of the educational process, including students, faculty members and teachers.

Several universities, including Helwan University, reported COVID-19 cases among its staff and students, while others, including Cairo University, announced a plan to deal with infections.

The council’s decision comes after a noticeable increase in the spread of the coronavirus indicated by the Corona Tracker, which showed that Egypt has officially registered 143,464 cases of coronavirus, including 7,863 fatalities, since 5 January.

On the African continent, Egypt ranked second after South Africa in the reported death rate per capita and the number of health worker deaths.

Vaccine impact will take time

Magdi Tawfik Abdelhamid, professor of molecular biotechnology at Cairo’s National Research Centre in Egypt, told University World News that higher education institutions in Egypt and on the African continent should realise that it was likely to be a few years before COVID-19 could be brought under control worldwide as the distribution of vaccines globally would be challenging and their effect would not be immediate.

“Egyptian and African academic communities must be ready for another coronavirus pandemic wave that might crash over us as there is still only a slim chance of getting hold of enough vaccines for about 103 million Egyptians or 1.3 billion Africans,” Abdelhamid added.

“This is because there will be several challenges to deal with, including sufficient production capacity, vaccination supplies, and staffing as well as an adequate supply chain to reach at least 75% to 100% of the Egyptian and African population based on the efficacy of the vaccine used,” Abdelhamid pointed out.

An October 2020 study, “Vaccine efficacy needed for a COVID-19 coronavirus vaccine to prevent or stop an epidemic as the sole intervention”, concluded that a vaccine “has to have an efficacy of at least 70% to prevent an epidemic and of at least 80% to largely extinguish an epidemic without any other measures (such as social distancing). In both instances, the vaccination should cover at least 75% of the population. An efficacy below these figures would require a potentially unachievable 100% coverage of the population.

Monitoring the virus

Abdelhamid called for the development of an observatory to monitor studies dealing with models about the prediction and spread of COVID-19 in Egypt.

He said that these type of studies such as “Modelling, control, and prediction of the spread of COVID-19 using compartmental, logistic, and Gauss models: A case study in Iraq and Egypt”, “Forecasting the prevalence of COVID-19 outbreak in Egypt using nonlinear autoregressive artificial neural networks” and “Prediction of the COVID-19 spread in African countries and implications for prevention and control: A case study in South Africa, Egypt, Algeria, Nigeria, Senegal and Kenya” could provide guidance to decision-makers at universities to adjust to the new norm and to put in place short-term future plans to face this epidemic.”