Education and COVID-19: Facts, insights and vital lessons

International Journal of Research and Innovation in Applied Science (IJRIAS) | Volume VII, Issue IV, April 2022 | ISSN 2454–6194

Education and COVID-19: Facts, insights and vital lessons

 David Gitumu Mugo (PhD)
Karatina University, P.O.Box 1957-10101, Karatina, Kenya

Abstract: COVID-19, a severe and fatal human respiratory ailment caused by Severe Acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was first reported in Wuhan, China in December 2019. The purpose of the paper was to explore the scientific findings regarding SARS-CoV-2, its epidemiology and impact to the education system. The study was a documentary analysis of virtual documents stored electronically for access through the internet, text books, archival repositories as well as encyclopedia. The key findings indicated that genomic features of the virus demonstrated close phylogenic relationships with other viruses important to human illnesses. This disapproved a public argument that the virus was a laboratory construct. Further the study demonstrated that the transmission of the virus was chiefly exponential resulting to rapid outbreak of the ailment throughout China and other parts of the habitable world. The containment measure adopted by governments and states was largely lockdown of operations in many sectors of the economy, including education. By highlighting facts and insights on interventions adopted globally, the paper was able to provide a deeper understanding of COVID-19 within an educational context. The lessons gathered from the period of the epidemic are highlighted and can be useful to educationists when handling an epidemic in the future.
Keywords: COVID-19, ELearning, Learner, Technology
I. BACKGROUND
The 21st century has been marked by major technological breakthrough in the area of public health. Expanded programs on vaccination and immunization have resulted to containment of otherwise communicable and infectious diseases such as whooping cough, measles, tuberculosis and yellow fever. On the other hand modern times have been exposed to the re-emergence of old diseases such as cholera, plague and yellow fever. Similarly and disturbing, new epidemics such as Ebola virus disease, Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, Zika, Chikungunya, Avian and other zoonotic influenza, Middle-East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), Monkey Pox and Pandemic Influenza have emerged posing quite major threats to global public health (WHO 2018). Each of the indicated pandemic have had their role in disrupting the supply of education and public administration
COVID-19 – Early findings
In December 2019, medical practitioners observed a series of pneumonia cases of an unknown cause in Wuhan City, Hubei Province in the Peoples’ Republic of China (WHO 2019, World Bank 2020). Samples obtained from lower respiratory tract of the pneumonia patients were quickly analyzed by the National Health Commission of the Peoples’ Republic of China and the World Health Organization (WHO). Laboratory tests confirmed that the ailment was due to a new virus that belonged to the Corona Virus family (coronidae), which had not been previously identified in human. The International

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