The IES Santa Úrsula, in the north of Tenerife, has received this Tuesday, February 15, a bomb notice from someone who said he was anti-vaccines. The events occurred around 10:00 in the morning, when a person telephoned the Town Hall and reported that there was an explosive device in the center.
Immediately, both the mayor, Juan Manuel Acosta, as the Councilor for Security, Antonio Damián González, and two technicians, accompanied by the Local Police, went to the center and then proceeded to evacuate all students and staff. In this institute there are 800 students, 73 teachers, three custodians and two administrative staff.
All the evacuees moved to the center’s sports field and to a nearby street, which was cut off while the Civil Guard, with a canine unit, searched the facilities. Finally, the search concluded without finding anything suspicious, so the students returned to the classrooms.
The management of the center has told this newspaper that both the students and the staff behaved “great”, collaborating at all times and leaving the facilities quickly and in an orderly manner.
The fathers and mothers, adds this source, were informed through a statement sent through the channels used by the center to communicate with them.
The reason for this notice is that next week a vacuguagua from the Ministry of Health will be installed next to the center to proceed with the COVID vaccination of minors who so wish and have the express consent of their parents.
From the center they emphasize that actions like this, in reference to the bomb warning, “do not lead to anything and hinder our work.”
This is the second bomb threat on the island by anti-vaccines, after something similar happened last week at the CEIP Isaac de Vega, in the municipality of Granadilla, in the south of Tenerife.
Other threats in the Canary Islands
These threats are added to those received at the beginning of the month by teaching staff of educational centers in which vaccines are being administered to minors, only to those who have the authorization of their parents. It was the ANPE Canarias union that denounced that professionals participating in the pilot vaccination program for children between 5 and 12 years of age against COVID-19 were being threatened by anti-vaccine groups.
The union stated in a statement that two associations opposed to the vaccination process and the use of masks sent intimidating letters to the centers in which they accused them of committing “serious crimes” and threatened the management staff with initiating legal action against them, as they already did with health workers.
The Canary Islands Health Service has also been the target of anti-vaccines and deniers. In January, thousands of emails were sent to nurses and auxiliaries who participate in the vaccination campaign from December 2021 in the Islands to children under 12 years of age. These professionals received in their corporate emails a document in PDF format with threatening messages regarding the pediatric campaign they are developing to immunize the population between 5 and 12 years of age against the coronavirus, as reported by the director of the SCS, Conrado Domínguez. The letters were signed by two groups: the Asociación Nacional Sovida and the Asociación Nacional Leaders College International.
In the letters it was ensured that they were “committing serious crimes classified in the Penal Code against minors.”
