The isolation period for unvaccinated school students in Victoria has been slashed in half to seven days in a bid to minimise disruption in the classroom.
Unvaccinated students will only need to isolate for seven days if they are a primary close contact of a positive case of COVID-19, rather than 14 days as of November 15.
However, they will need to undertake rapid tests every day for the remaining seven days after isolating for an initial seven-day period.
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https://twitter.com/DougalBeatty/status/1457490199710081024They also must return a negative PCR test on day six of their isolation.
The move will get unvaccinated students back into classrooms one week earlier than planned.
Students aged under 12 will be primarily offered rapid tests, which will be made available to schools and pupils free of charge.
Education Minister James Merlino said if students returned negative rapid tests, they could continue to go to school.
"It is just another mitigation measure to make our schools safer, but at the same time minimise disruption to our kids," he said.
The rapid tests can return a result for COVID-19 within 15-30 minutes.
It comes as the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) approved the use of home rapid antigen testing from November 1.
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The tests will initially be rolled out to 20 schools this week, before being offered to all schools state-wide next week.
The relaxing of the rules is set to ease frustration among parents, which Mr Merlino said he heard "loud and clear".
"I know this is frustrating, it's frustrating for schools, it's frustrating for parents and carers," he said.
"What we are trying to do is make school life as normal as possible."
The isolation period for vaccinated students is already seven days.
Victoria recorded 1126 new cases of COVID-19 and five further deaths today.
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