There is no evidence that would link the spike in registered new COVID-19 cases is related to the reopening of schools, Health Minister Chris Fearne told this newsroom on Monday.

Over the weekend, Malta saw its highest consecutive number of new cases with 100 being registered on Saturday and 95 on Sunday. This comes just after most schools across Malta and Gozo reopened for the new scholastic.

Notably, since schools opened again, there have been 7 reported cases of students or staff who were discovered in schools.

The Malta Independent asked Fearne is the health authorities will be considering implementing further restrictions on schools or close them down completely once again and opt for online learning.

“So far it did not result that we had a big amount of cases in the community because we opened schools,” Fearne said. “It is still early so we can’t reach conclusions one way or another; but in Malta nor in other countries with open schools has it resulted that there was an increase in cases.”

He explained that there were cases in university towns in the UK for instance, but there certainly have not been in school children and it is the same in other countries.

Asked if the rise in new cases could be related to the reopening of schools, he said; “we do not have evidence that the spike in cases is tied to the opening of schools.”