ACT TEACHERS Partylist Representative France Castro on Wednesday urged the Inter-Agency Task Force to bump teachers up in the vaccine list and include them in the A4 category.

The lawmaker said many teachers are getting infected with Covid19 while performing their tasks.

Castro stressed that teachers are essential frontline workers too as they have been dealing with the new challenges brought by the pandemic.

“With the alarming surge of Covid19 infections, more and more teachers have fallen ill due to the virus. The Department of Education has yet to report the extent of infection among our teachers and non-teaching personnel, especially that many teachers have reported of being required to report physically even outside of module distribution days, and despite the lack of adequate safety measures in schools,” she added.

The lawmaker said that though inoculation is not a prerequisite to face-to-face classes, giving priority to teachers and education personnel would greatly protect them from contracting the virus.

“Prioritizing teachers and education support personnel in the vaccination roll-out shows how the Duterte administration value its education frontliners and how it values the right of every Filipino youth to access to quality education. A step towards giving access to quality education to our youth is prioritizing teachers and other education support personnel in the government’s vaccination plan,” Castro said.