{"id":127911,"date":"2021-06-11T17:05:51","date_gmt":"2021-06-11T15:05:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=127911"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:25:41","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:25:41","slug":"majority-of-students-and-staff-shun-coronavirus-testing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2021\/06\/11\/majority-of-students-and-staff-shun-coronavirus-testing\/","title":{"rendered":"Majority of students and staff shun coronavirus testing"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u2018Self-test = not stressed\u2019 is the slogan of a new campaign. They\u2019re hoping to convince staff and students of universities and universities of applied sciences to take a test at home before heading to campus.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\n\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\tImage by:<\/span>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tTim Ficheroux<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>

It\u2019s been possible to order these free home testing kits since 5 May from www.zelftestonderwijs.nl<\/a>. The purpose of the tests is to make classroom teaching safer. It\u2019s especially when you do not have any symptoms that you need to use a test. Anyone who does have symptoms should go straight to the community health service GGD.<\/p>\n

Generally speaking, about 789,000 students and 106,000 staff are eligible to order tests (not counting, for example, Inholland University of Applied Sciences which is actively distributing test kits). As of Monday, 31 May, 213,000 students had placed orders; for staff the figure is 53,000.<\/p>\n

Swab<\/h2>

A quick guestimate thus reveals that about half of staff have ordered tests and only about a third of students (allowing some leeway for work placements and part-time students). And then they have to actually use them: put the swab up their nose, twirl it around, apply drops, then wait.<\/p>\n

Whoever ordered two or three test kits has been counted two or three times in these figures, but presumably that isn\u2019t so many people: for each order you are sent four test kits (and from 1 June as many as eight test kits), while students and staff don\u2019t need to visit campus that often.<\/p>\n

Students\u2019 willingness to self-test is therefore rather underwhelming, as already forecast by the first results<\/a> of trials. In the final analysis, only 30 percent of those students at Avans University of Applied Sciences, HAS University of Applied Sciences and Koning Willem I Polytechnic approached participated in the pilot. This corroborates more or less with the number of students who have, up to now, ordered home testing kits.<\/p>\n

Not mandatory<\/h2>

One of the reasons for low uptake: testing is not mandatory. Whether you test or not carries no tangible consequences, and most home tests are, by far, negative. Evidently these two reasons combined reduce student motivation.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what happened in Groningen. Only a quarter of students bothered to show up at the rapid testing location. \u201cOne of the reasons they mentioned for not coming was the distance to the testing location\u201d, RTV Noord writes. \u201cThey also had concerns about the impact of testing positive. Students understood that they wouldn\u2019t be able to enter the examination hall, but wondered when and how they could make up the exam.\u201d So the testing location is closing.<\/p>\n

At Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam the trial will continue to run through the middle of August, but \u201cevents seem to have overtaken\u201d the pilot, given the ready availability of home testing kits and vaccinations, the University disclosed.\u00a0\u201cWe see that willingness to be tested is lagging behind our expectations, because no immediate benefit has been attached to students getting tested.\u201d Classroom teaching continues to observe social distancing, with all the necessary restrictions.<\/p>\n

Read more<\/h2>