All primary school students will be back in the classroom today.

As part of the phased reopening of schools, another 350,000 children go back to school this morning for the first time this year.

Every primary school year is now back at the blackboards, with fifth-year students joining Leaving Certificate classes, who returned on March 1st.

The remaining secondary school students, first, second, third and fourth years, will join them on April 12th as part of a gradual reopening of Ireland’s education system.

24 new cases in Cork

Meanwhile, a further 349 new cases of coronavirus were confirmed in the past 24 hours, 24 in Cork, with no further deaths from the disease.

Of the latest cases, 195 are men and 187 are women and 73% are under 45 years of age. The median age is 31 years old.

The Government is awaiting more information from the European Medicines Agency (EMA) regarding the safety of the AstraZeneca vaccine, the rollout of which has been paused in Ireland after the drug was reported to have caused blood clots in younger patients.

The decision to temporarily suspend use of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine was based on new information from Norway that emerged late last night. This is a precautionary step. The National Immunisation Advisory Comm meets again this morning and we’ll provide an update after that

— Stephen Donnelly (@DonnellyStephen) March 14, 2021

While there are no reports of blood clots occurring in Irish patients who received the vaccine, Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr Ronan Glynn said he is awaiting more ‘reassuring’ data.

“Of particular concern are specifically clots in the brain of younger people in their 30s, 40s – that’s unusual,” he told RTÉ Radio One’s This Week.