To think that kids with nits should be sent home

[JugglingNStruggling]

I don't know why kids aren't sent home if they have nits and prevented from coming back to school until their parents get rid of them
at the moment there seem to be a fair number of parents who don't seem to care if their child goes to school with nits and gives them to everybody in sight
I don't think there should be a stigma to catch nits, but there should be one if you keep coming to school and inflicting it on everybody else's kids
The school & other parents expect me to keep my kids at home if they are sick or have diarrhoea (not a notifiable disease) and I think this is quite reasonable and abide by this
The school and parents expect me not to give my kids peanut butter sandwiches in case somebody is allergic to nuts and I think this is quite reasonable and abide by this
Why can't this be extended to nits
Why do some parents seem to think that it is not unreasonable to inflict nits on everybody else

Are boys less likely to catch nits? Trying to prepare myself for DS starting school.

rathlin DS1- no nits whatsoever even when he had longish hair. now in yr 4. But he tends to hang around with other boys and has always played ball games at play time. Hoever DS2 is in Yr R and is a complete nit magnet. He has much shorter hair He tends to have more boy and girl friends is quite cuddly and likes playing chase games at playtime.
So basically I think its related to how they are with personal space rather than sex/ hair length

That was my point, Rabbitee. It is normal to get lice maybe once or twice a year. It is not normal to not be able to get rid of them because a school doesn't insist on treatment. The threat of my ds being embarrassed and sent home made me check him much more carefully than the mere warning that there was lice around. The more people think it is normal to have lice, the less anyone will bother to check and treat and the lice will just become more prevalent.

I check, comb and treat (actually I dont check, I just comb as a matter of course these days), but I still see it as something to be borne until senior school.

Maybe it is UK conditioning, but I still dont see what getting angry will do.

I do not think it is normal to have live which is why I check my daughter almost daily.

However the girl's mother does not care and by telling the girl that she can't go to school you are only making it more likely that she fails to escape her rather pitiful life by getting some qualifications. If you send the child home the mum will not be ashamed, she will not carE and it certainly will not make her get the nit comb out.

YABA yes nits are extremely annoying but they are not life threatening and won't make a child ill. DD2 was always getting them when she was younger and I was forever treating her.

To those who think checking for nits doesn't need to be done when their children go to senior school. Yes it does in fact DD2 caught more Luce there.Partly because a lot of parents think they don't have to check older children.

mumeee, I do still comb DD1 who is 14, but I have found that she hasnt had them since she left primary apart from once in the summer holidays when i was still battling the lice the others had!

Fingers crossed it stays that way!

Jus reading this thread is making me itch. I cant stand head lice. We have to inform the school if our children have it and then they send out a letter informing the parents.
My childs had them about 3 times (only once in school, other times in nursery). I kept her off school until they were gone. Yes its not an illness and it doesnt stop her doing her schoolwork but if everybody did this then less and less people would get head lice.

Vosene doesn't work (may have an unquantifiable effect as deterrent, but no treatment value). It'll be the regular combing mentioned in the same post that does it.

The trouble is that UK nits are now basically resistant to pesticides. Combing is the only thing that will do it now.

As you cannot comb out live eggs (they're pretty much cemented on) you could pick up your DC in the morning, comb thoroughly, return child to school and an egg hatches that very afternoon (one louse will lay about 30 eggs) and the hatchling could move to another child later that very day.

So, those who want children kept off school are calling for an exclusion for the life-cycle of the louse (2-3 weeks per infestation, need to check exact life cycle). Anything less than would be ineffective, and just a sop to vengeful feelings.

Now, any teachers here like to describe the likely impact on learning if, say, a third of the class were missing that much? Probably on a rolling basis, as the apparently uninfested may well be about to break out.

Zombie troll