The Education Ministry has pledged to find a solution to the unwillingness of staff members to administer the life-saving EpiPen, according to the parent of a severely allergic schoolboy.
Children with allergies are still facing potentially life-threatening risks at St Claire’s College Sliema Primary, a week after it emerged that there was no first aiders and personnel trained to apply the auto-injector in case a child went into anaphylactic shock.
Katarina Rafajova, who initially flagged the issue after she was told not to send her five-year-old son to school with an EpiPen, told Times of Malta that the Education Ministry has promised her a solution this coming week.
Her son Luca was one of a couple of children with severe allergies attending the Sliema primary school where the current protocol if a child goes into anaphylactic shock is to call an ambulance.
However, seeing as a child in this state could die within 15 minutes if the case is severe, the exercise is extremely risky and could prove fatal.
“I am still sending Luca to school with his EpiPen and hoping and praying that nothing will go wrong. I really don’t want to change his school. He’s so happy there otherwise. The teachers are great and I don’t want to separate him from his friends.”
The EpiPen isn’t something complicated to administer
While the school head was trying her best to find an answer for this problem, it seemed to be largely out of her hands, added Ms Rafajova.
She said she was frustrated that the Education Ministry initially only responded to her concerns by asking her to lodge a standard form requesting medicine to be given to her child.
“The form they asked me to fill out does not apply in the case of the EpiPen. I repeated to them that the school confirmed that no one would administer the EpiPen in case my son would need it,” she said.
However, after Ms Rafajova called up the Education Ministry again last Friday and explained the situation, they pledged to present her with a solution this week, she said.
According to the Malta Union of Teachers, the issue regarding the unwillingness to apply the EpiPen is rooted to the fact that first aiders were not being provided with training to administer life-saving medicines.
However, Education Minister Evarist Bartolo cautioned for people to keep in mind that the EpiPen was straightforward to use and said the fear that teachers had of applying it was misplaced.
“The EpiPen isn’t something complicated to administer. It is something that can mean the difference between life and death. But we need to be mindful not to overstate the skills you need to apply the auto-injecter. This is a simple procedure and first aiders learn how to do it in a couple of minutes,” Mr Bartolo had told Times of Malta.
He reiterated that the Education Ministry would bear full legal responsibility for designated first aiders in schools, including those who administer the EpiPen.
Furthermore, Mr Bartolo also said he was going to launch a strong campaign to address the significant lack of first aiders in state schools.