Some Saskatchewan students will be seeing more tests at their schools when they go back to class.
The Saskatchewan government announced Tuesday it was launching a pilot project in 24 schools around the province to provide COVID-19 self-testing rapid antigen kits to families with students under the age of 12.
People under 12 currently aren’t eligible for COVID vaccines.
According to the government, the schools “will be determined in consultation with the school divisions and Medical Health Officers (MHOs) based on a variety of factors such as vaccination coverage, active cases, hospitalizations and school outbreaks.”
The government said more schools will be added to the program in the future. Students are to begin returning to class Wednesday.
“With the resumption of in-class learning, parents with eligible children in participating schools will receive notification from those schools on receiving testing kits,” the government said in a media release.
The tests are capable of providing results in 15 minutes. Those results should be validated by a lab-based PCR test.
The provincial government announced in March it would be sending 100,000 rapid tests to K-12 schools in the province and some students started taking the tests in May.