All across the country right now there are current and prospective third-level students wondering if they should book student accommodation for the coming academic year. Equally, many parents are fretting about budgets, plans and the practicalities of next year.

Meanwhile, third-level college staff, at the end of an exhausting year of online education, attend planning meetings with a strong whiff of deja vu. These meetings seem very similar to meetings that were held in June 2020, with plans A, B and C for how programmes will be delivered in September, depending on the public health situation at the time.

Hospital Report

Students want to return to campus. This is understandable. While there have been some unexpected silver linings to online learning, the experience for college students has been, on balance, challenging, isolating and stressful. Many have described their struggle to remain engaged and retain motivation, as they roll from bed to laptop to attend a Zoom lecture.

Enabling students to return to some level of normality and on-campus teaching in September should be a public health priority. Young adults in general are a high-risk group for emergence of mental health problems. A significant body of research suggests that younger people overall have been disproportionately negatively affected by the pandemic. Therefore, people in this cohort are in need of all the support they can get to mitigate the risks to mental health.

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Minister for Higher Education Simon Harris also wants to see students return to campus. The Government is gung-ho in its plans for a full return to third-level education in person. On June 15th, Harris, in a public announcement on the plan for opening colleges and university campuses, stated: “I’d expect the overwhelming majority of our students to be vaccinated before the college year resumes.”

It is important now to consider if there is a reasonable argument to prioritise third-level students for vaccination over the general population in the coming months

The plans for the return to campus are predicated on this assumption. High levels of vaccination among third-level students for the return in September are essential to reduce risk from Covid-19 and protect students, staff and people living in wider college environments, such as the towns where students live.

Delta variant

The problem is that Harris’s statement is at odds with recent announcements about the time schedule for the vaccination programme rollout. Vaccine registration opened just recently for first dose vaccination for people aged 35-39. The HSE is not expecting the vaccination programme to move into the 20-29 cohort until late August. This schedule suggests that the majority of third-level students (a significant proportion of whom are not yet 20) will be offered their first vaccination in August, September or October. Therefore, many third-level students will not be fully vaccinated – which we know is critical to offer protection against the Delta variant – until nearer the end of the first semester. This means a whole semester of negotiating on-campus learning with a largely unvaccinated group of adults may lie ahead.

Therefore, it is important now to consider if there is a reasonable argument to prioritise third-level students for vaccination over the general population in the coming months.

While age is the primary risk factor for prioritisation within the national Covid-19 Vaccine Allocation Strategy, the National Immunisation Advisory Committee (Niac) prioritises “people aged 16-64 living or working in crowded settings over the general public (aged 64 years and younger)”. International allocation rules to prioritise populations for vaccination concur, such as those presented by Covid-End, an international evidence network to support decision-making around Covid-19, which place “people in social environments that put them at elevated risk for Covid-19” in a higher priority group than “mass public”.

Third-level students fall into this higher risk category. They commonly live and work in crowded settings (such as halls of residence, shared accommodation, lecture theatres and libraries). I remember speaking with a distressed student in October last year, as she told me about the challenges of staying safe in a house shared with seven others. She was exhausted, as most evenings she didn’t eat dinner until after 11pm. She and her housemates had set up a rota for using the kitchen in a way that ensured social distancing. Surely this is an unrealistic way to expect anyone to live?

High take-up

So, if third-level students vaccination, would they take it? Research suggests that the majority would, but we need to encourage them with targeted communication and ensure that the operational aspects of getting vaccinated don’t act as a barrier.

Vaccine hesitancy rates, the number of people who say they either won’t get vaccinated for Covid-19 or are unsure about taking a vaccine, are about 10 per cent. A recent survey conducted by Ipsos MRBI for the Irish Pharmaceutical Healthcare Association (IPHA) reported that 89 per cent of people intended to take a vaccine or had already received one. The number wanting to take the vaccine across all age groups has risen steadily since January.

While hesitancy rates are slightly higher among younger age groups, especially women, the vast majority of people in this age group say they would take a vaccine if offered it.

University buildings, which are largely empty over the summer months, present an ideal setting in which vaccinations could be offered to students

A recent survey by the ESRI of 1,600 adults about Covid-19 vaccination intention reported a link between a reluctance to take the vaccine and a lack of knowledge and awareness of its benefits. Third-level students are likely to perceive lower levels of personal risk from Covid-19 and fewer benefits of the vaccine to themselves personally than older adults. Where vaccination motivation and intention are weaker, removing practical barriers to getting vaccinated becomes more critical. The current arrangement of vaccination in centralised vaccination hubs, some of which are inconveniently located and hard to access without a car, is likely to deter some students from seeking vaccination.

If the government and universities are genuinely committed to delivering safe on-campus education from September, they need to work in tandem now to ensure that vaccination is prioritised for student populations and is as easy as possible, with practical environmental barriers removed. University buildings, which are largely empty over the summer months, present an ideal setting in which vaccinations could be offered to students. Students will be motivated by communications that stress the societal and social benefits of vaccination. The carrot for everyone here is returning to campus in September.