As the reopening dates of schools in Shanghai have been announced, they are now endeavoring to draw up plans to ensure the security and health of their students. As a school principal said, the difficulty lies in concentrated dining. As the space in classrooms is limited and because students have to take off their masks to eat, how to protect them from COVID-19 has been a big concern. Here are some suggestions of two doctors: Zeng Mei and Hua Haimei.

Zeng is director of the Department of Infectious Diseases of the Children’s Hospital of Fudan University and a member of Shanghai’s COVID-19 clinical expert team. Hua is director of the Department of Dietetics of the Children’s Hospital of Fudan University.

The two doctors’ advice is: keep quiet and eat slowly, and it is also best to eat more than 12 kinds of food each day.

“Cross contamination will not happen as long as they do not talk, cough, or sneeze during meals,” they said.

If possible, schools can separate the dining tables at an interval of one meter or more. If not, they can set up screens between diners to keep each other apart. For students who take their own tableware to the school, it is suggested that they simply wash the tableware after meals or take it home. Then boiled water should be used for disinfecting the chopsticks and spoons.

Apart from school meals, how about the children’s breakfast and dinner? Parents also wonder what kind of diet is scientific and nutritious. According to Dr. Hua, diets should be balanced. It is not suggested to only eat porridge as you need sufficient protein. “Take breakfast for example. You can prepare some cereal, poultry eggs, and milk for your children, and try to enrich the variety of the diet. For supper, staple foods are essential. You can have poultry, livestock, eggs, and prepare some fruit after the meal. It is better to have supper between 6 and 7 pm.”

Hua also recommended that over 12 kinds of food be eaten per day and 25 kinds per week, excluding edible oils or condiments.

The Grade 9 and Grade 12 students will restart school on April 27, and according to the latest statement of the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, the Grade 8 and Grade 11 students will return to school on May 6. Other grades in secondary schools and Grade 4 and 5 students in primary schools will return on May 18.

Some schools in the city have made emergency plans for the prevention and control of COVID-19. In addition to classrooms, the auditoriums and teachers’ canteens have been deployed for separate dining.

Some other schools have decided to package the meals which will be distributed to each student during lunch time. Staff at the canteens will have to undergo sanitation before and after service and the reused tableware must be disinfected and undergo steam sterilization. Also, the classrooms will be sanitized on a regular basis each day.