The June 14 lead story — ‘COVID-special ed link?’ — in the Jamaica Observer regarding the “alarming” surge in children with special educational needs and the suggestion that this may be linked to the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2021) raises an important issue for discussion. However, I believe we must acknowledge a critical truth: This problem existed long before COVID.

The article cites assistant chief education officer in the Special Education Unit of the Ministry of Education (MOE) Dionne Gayle-Smart’s suggestion that if the Ministry of Health had shared data on babies born during the pandemic showing early signs of special needs, the education ministry could have planned ahead. While inter-ministerial collaboration is undoubtedly important, we cannot let the pandemic obscure the reality that Jamaica’s special education crisis predates 2020.

In 2016, the MOE’s local office in Manchester documented over 1,500 children with developmental delays, autism, and cognitive challenges requiring special education support — four years before COVID-19. The Educational Assessment and Intervention Centre at Church Teachers’ College opened in Mandeville, Manchester, in 2019, specifically to serve children with autism and cognitive challenges, again before the pandemic.

Early Stimulation Programme registrations doubled from 1,450 children in 2016 to over 3,000 in 2021 — showing the problem was already growing well before the pandemic years.

While we must examine any potential COVID-19-related factors, I believe we are missing a more significant driver: a widespread lack of parental awareness about developmental needs and available support services.

Many parents do not know when developmental milestones should occur, that autism can be identified as early as age two, how to access services like the Early Stimulation Programme or Educational Assessment and Intervention Centre, and that early intervention dramatically improves long-term outcomes. Far too many wait until children are school-age — sometimes four or five years old, non-verbal, and without support — before seeking diagnosis and help.

Jamaica’s special education crisis is not new, it is a decades-long challenge, and addressing it demands two urgent responses. First, the Government must launch a sustained national awareness campaign — through schools, health centres, community groups, and media — to educate parents on developmental milestones and how to access early intervention services. Second, the ministries of health and education must establish structured, routine data-sharing so that children showing early signs of developmental needs are identified and referred to support services before they reach school age.

These are not expensive fixes, they are coordination and communication. We owe them to our children.

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