As the coverage of Ebola hits a fever pitch, many are being moved to panic due to various media reports highlighting the worst. Evidence of this is illustrated by 9-year-old Kofi Mason-Sesay‘s (pictured) experience of not being allowed to resume school at St. Simon’s Catholic Primary School in Stockport, England, even though both he and his mother’s health records reportedly show they are Ebola-free, reports BBC.
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Kofi lives in Sierra Leone with his mother, Miriam Mason-Sesay (pictured below), who works for the UK charity EducAid. When they are not in Sierra Leone, he and his mother often visit England, where he attends St. Simon’s.
But when he attempted to enroll in St. Simon’s this go-round, a group of parents reportedly banded together to keep Kofi out of the school.
School officials reportedly responded to the parents’ concerns by assuring the group that they had gone through the proper protocol to ensure that Kofi and his family were Ebola-free.
Miriam even went on record to say, “If I am well enough to be up and about, then I am not sick enough to contaminate you even if I’ve got it coming, which I haven’t.”
However, the parents reportedly refused to listen, causing headteacher Elizabeth Inman to write the following letter to Kofi’s parents:
“It is with great sadness that we decided to cancel the visit; the misguided hysteria emerging is extremely disappointing, distracting us from our core purpose of educating your children and [it] is not an environment that I would wish a visitor to experience.”
“It is unfortunate that some misplaced anxiety and misinformation about Ebola, amongst a small group of parents, has been circulated amongst the wider parent body.
“The school has sought, and received, assurances from the relevant health agencies that the visit would pose no risk to health.
“Despite these assurances, this has not alleviated the concerns of the group, leading to the cancellation.”
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