The Ghana Education Service has said it will increase surveillance in schools across the country, intensify contact tracing and take necessary action where need be in the Covid-19 fight.

This, according to the service has become necessary as it has emerged some heads of schools are refusing to obey Covid-19 guidelines.

“If we have to close the school, we will close the school down to ensure the safety of learners.”

Speaking on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show Friday, a parent, Eyram expressed shock at how some school authorities are handling Covid-19 cases among students.

According to her, their 13-year-old JHS 2 boy tested positive for covid-19 after schools reopened and the school authorities, upon hearing the news asked her to conceal it.

“To our surprise, they said they didn’t want to cause panic and so we should try and keep the information to ourselves,” she said.

Eyram is burdened as no authority had called to follow up on her son and a possibility that a carrier may currently be spreading the virus.

The Inspector-General of schools at the Ministry of Education, Dr Hilda Ampadu, responding to the claim said keeping one’s status secret was not the best on the part of the school authorities.

“We trained them on [how to handle such occurrences] when we had the zoom call before re-opening.”

She observed that some schools may have submitted to have health workers available in the school “but when you go on inspection, you realise that, that person [health worker] doesn’t exist, it happens everywhere.”

She, however, noted that while some will comply, others may violet the protocols “so that is where monitoring and evaluation come in.”

Dr Ampadu stressed that the reported school will have to be shut down if the allegation is confirmed because it is a clear departure from the GES protocols for Covid-19.

Meanwhile, Health officials on Thursday confirmed at least 42 positive Covid-19 cases in a private school at Akosombo in the Eastern Region, and another one in Akyem Oda.

However, Director of Human Resources at the Volta River Authority Health Services has assured the students are in good care and currently doing fine.

“We have counselled the students to make them feel more at home especially when they realised that they were not showing any signs and symptoms.”

According to him, the students are the ones encouraging some parents who were initially worried about the development.

“It got to a point that even the students themselves were comforting their parents because of the kind of treatment that we are giving them and so initially, yes, parents were a bit worried but now it's better.”