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Disaster Management Act, 2002 (Act No. 57 of 2002)

Notices

Directions regarding measures to prevent and combat the spread of COVID-19 i.t.o. the return of children to ECD programmes, in Partial Care Facilities, Old Age Homes and Frail Care Facilities

5. Conditions for return of children to ECD programme or partial care facility

 

(1) A parent, legal guardian or a person designated by a parent or legal guardian, may, as far as it is practical, return a child to the same ECD programme or partial care facility that the child attended during the month that the national state of disaster was first announced: Provided that such a programme or facility complies with the provisions of direction 4.

 

(2) Subject to subdirection (4), a child must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian, or, if not practically possible, by a person designated by a parent or legal guardian, every day when the child arrives at an ECD programme or a partial care facility and must be screened as provided for in direction 6.

 

(3) In the case of a child who is two years or younger and accompanied by a designated person, a parent or legal guardian must provide the designated person with the required information for the purpose of symptom screening in terms of direction 6.

 

(4) Where a child arrives at an ECD programme or partial care facility without being accompanied by a person contemplated in subdirection (2) or without any information that may assist with symptom screening, that child must not be refused entry to the ECD programme or partial care facility and the procedure set out in the standard operating procedures must be applied.

 

(5) A parent, legal guardian or a person designated by a parent or legal guardian has a right to inquire from the ECD programme or partial care facility about the measures that have been put in place as required in terms of direction 4, before the parent, legal guardian or the person designated by the parent or legal guardian considers returning a child to an ECD programme or partial care facility.

 

(6) A child with a known underlying health condition that may place the child at a higher than normal risk category as defined by the Department of Health, may not return to an ECD programme or partial care facility, unless a medical practitioner gives a written authorisation that it is safe for such a child to return to, and participate in, the ECD programme or partial care facility.

 

(7) An ECD programme or partial care facility must inform every parent, legal guardian or a person designated by a parent or legal guardian who returns a child to the ECD programme or partial care facility—
(a) of the provisions of subdirections (1) to (6);
(b) that the return of a child to an ECD programme or partial care facility is voluntary; and
(c) that a child who  returns to the  ECD programme  or partial care facility  will  be subjected to a daily screening as contemplated in direction 6.