Help! My child just started swimming lessons, but the mayor doesn't get it!

A hot topic in the schoolyard: “My child has only just started and already learned so much in the very first lesson.” “My child has already moved up to the next group.” “My child found it really nerve-racking, but the teacher handled it so well and she went home laughing.” “My child took part in the whole lesson with a smile.”

These are the everyday conversations parents have with one another when it comes to swimming lessons. It's a journey that both parents and children go through, and one in which a child's pride comes shining through. “Look, Mummy, what I did!” or “Look, Daddy, I've moved up to the next group!” The enthusiasm — even if it's a little put on — is all part of the process. Children want their parents to be proud of them.

Now imagine that after every lesson all you got was a brief summary, told by your child, and from that you had to work out how things were really going. Imagine your child found it so daunting that they cried through the entire lesson. Imagine your child took a tumble and got hurt. Imagine the teacher was strict with your child — whether it was deserved or not — but you never hear that last bit, and you have no idea why your child is so quiet. This is the ordinary communication between parents, children and the teachers or coordinator who belongs there and needs to be there. Children have fears just as much as parents do. There's no way around this, and there shouldn't be.

Last night I watched, with some astonishment, a video of the Mayor of Emmen, Eric van Oosterhout. He was responding to the uproar surrounding the QR code at swimming pools and the parents who — for whatever reason — cannot or will not present one. His answer was cold and matter-of-fact. Something that, in my opinion, is unbecoming of a mayor as a father figure to his community in a case like this. Van Oosterhout has been mayor of Emmen for nearly five years. In an interview he gave when he took office, he said a number of interesting things. “My passion is education. I've been involved with it ever since my student days. My first job had to do with children who had fallen behind at school. That was in the Delfzijl region. ‘Equal opportunities for everyone.’” So said Van Oosterhout in an interview with the Emmer Courant on 14 March 2017.

“From a public health perspective, it is still sensible to maintain the QR code and to check it at the entrance to the swimming pool,” Van Oosterhout went on to argue. In my view, the research by TU Delft has actually shown that there are quite a few catches to that. I would very much like to meet Mayor Van Oosterhout in person to explain to him what swimming lessons really mean: the involvement of a parent, the journey that parents and children have to go through, the safety aspect, the importance to children of continuity, and the achievement of the very first diploma of their lives. But surely Van Oosterhout should know all this as a father who has himself stood at the poolside.

Whether you talk about it at length or keep it short, the point remains that people are losing sight of the fact that there no longer seems to be any indication whatsoever that the coronavirus entry pass provides safety for the people in that space. All around us, people are getting infected. With two vaccines, and even with the booster. On the website gezondheidenwetenschap.be, its fact-check section says the following about this: “People who have recovered from a coronavirus infection develop antibodies against the virus and are immune for a certain period. These antibodies gradually disappear, however, so that a new infection can once again lead to covid-19. Moreover, the antibodies sometimes work less well against new variants of the coronavirus. The same goes for vaccination: after being fully vaccinated you are protected against covid-19 for a while, but after about six months infection can still make you ill again. A booster shot fortunately extends this period considerably. Vaccination can sometimes offer less protection against new variants. For all these reasons it is important to keep applying the hygiene measures, such as washing your hands, keeping your distance, wearing a face mask where necessary and ventilating rooms.”

All in all, then, whether you have a vaccine, a booster, a previous infection, or none of these, you can test just as positive as anyone else. Similar stories can be found at the NOS and in other media. So we don't need to do this for safety's sake. Let mayors like Eric van Oosterhout stand up for their own residents rather than following the line of the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport. Let mayors stand up for the children and their parents who have no voice, but who could well end up in the water six months from now. At 30-plus degrees you won't be keeping many children out of the water.

In short, let's not need 300 court cases to get our mayors — our civic mothers and fathers — to do the right thing for their residents and, in line with the judge's ruling: “The interim relief judge therefore holds that the main purpose of the activity during a ‘swimming lesson’ is swimming. In the judgment of the interim relief judge, this is not sport or entertainment. Children go to swimming lessons in order to learn to swim, in the interest of their own safety. The main purpose is the acquisition of swimming skills and not sport. Swimming lessons are therefore not a sport.”

Here the judge is speaking very clearly about the activity of swimming lessons. However much the Vereniging Sport en Gemeente, the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, and the — perhaps or perhaps not involved — NCTV may protest, the judge's description here concerns the activity in a broad sense and not just the pool in Hilversum.