30 buses are seen at Jilin Agricultural Science and Technology University in Northeast China's Jilin Province to transfer students following a cluster infection detected in the campus on March 10, 2022. Photo: Screenshot of CCTV News

Letting their guard down, especially when the COVID-19 epidemic situation has been stable for a long time, is one of the reasons for the ongoing cluster infections on campus in a dozen provinces and regions, China's Ministry of Education said on Tuesday. 

Wang Dengfeng, head of the department of physical, health and arts education at the Ministry of Education, said at a press conference that students from elementary schools to colleges in more than 10 provinces and regions were infected with the virus in the fresh wave of epidemic in China, and society is facing the challenge of how to remain alert and ensure the implementation of epidemic prevention and control measures when the epidemic has been stable. 

He said one important reason for the delayed response on campus was schools failed to timely launch emergency plans, especially quarantine. 

Schools did not form an effective and controllable mechanism in managing the travel records of students and their family members, and it's also difficult to manage students' off-school activities, Wang said. 

He said some schools have formed good experiences in regular epidemic prevention and control. East China's Fujian Province conducted random nucleic acid tests on students and faculty, which could save time in dealing with major outbreaks. 

The education system has to conduct a self-investigation to detect loopholes and problems and rectify them, Wang said.

In Northeast China's Jilin Province, which was hit hard by COVID-19, a cluster infection was detected at the Jilin Agricultural Science and Technology University. Zhang Lifeng, secretary of the university's Communist Party of China committee, was removed from his position last week for negligence and ineffective response.