School and no tests

[2020isajokex]

So fed up! DD started back at school. Completed 5 days with a weekend in between.

Her best friend was starting with a cold Monday. His mum sent him in and then he went swimming that night. Tuesday he's in school again, snotty and she said he was coughing a little that morning. Wednesday he's snotty again. DD begins to get snotty Wednesday. Along with their other friend.

Thursday morning. My child's been sneezing all night. Sniffing all night. Saying she feels rubbish. No fever or cough. But she looked tired, lake and watery eyed. I do what I feel is right. I contact the school and say it's a normal cold, none on the symptoms but because it's heavy today and she's had a rough night, I'll keep her off. She needed Calpol too. I said she'd return tomorrow if she's no worse.

That evening I get a phone call. It's the head. A few have gone off with colds. She said we are sure that's all it is but we had to ring public health. They've advised the kids with colds isolate for two weeks and get a test. She gave me a big speech about our local leisure centre doing tests this week and home kits were available too. 48 hours later apart from a testing center 2 hours away there's been absolutely nothing! No kits available anywhere. I can't justify a 4 hour drive in total. My youngest also has a cold. He gets travel sick within half an hour. We really needed somewhere within an hour. But there's literally nothing. Even the ridiculous location has gone.

My DD needs testing by Sunday or it's too late. Still nothing this morning! So it's looking like we will be isolating for two weeks! That's her missing out on two weeks of settling into a new class.

I'm really annoyed because the other child who's had a cold all week has been in school with it and that's ok? Runny noses are not a symptom. My child's going to be picking up colds alot and she's so young still.

I am really unhappy with this system. No tests available so now a child's missing a huge chunk of learning! If she has got covid, the only place she's been is the school. So if they don't have an answer either way are they going to shut her class? Because I can't confirm either way!

We haven't run out of tests. If you look at the capacity compared to the amount of tests carried out there's a difference of around 150,000 tests or was when I last looked. We just can't get them. I've been trying since Monday to get tests for ds and me. Symptoms in children are different and the government and Phe are for whatever reason not making this information readily available. From other threads it's been documented by the WHO that symptoms in children are more likely to be gastro, fatigue, sore throat, runny nose. I think there was something in the guardian a few days ago.
Ds started with abdo pain, sore throat, temperature, runny nose, sneezing, cough, then random aches and ear ache. I've been similar but my symptoms have been mainly headache, sore throat, cough and tight chest and I'm now on oral steroids for my asthma. School gave us a test for ds but we all need testing as his sisters have been unwell too but not enough that would normally keep them off. Dd was only back one day and now isolating for 2 weeks. Ds and I are still unwell and no one to take his test to the post box and I couldn't get hold of 119 to arrange a courier. We are now on day 6 so too late for tests. Dd2 has just started secondary school and has had 3 days in. It's shit but I'm ecv and I'd rather they are not does sing anything round or at risk of getting anything else especially as we are in a hotspot.

To illustrate my point above about capacity compared to actual tests completed.

This is the guidance we have from Ds's SEN school. Much more sensible.

For clarity –
Your child should be OK to come to school:
• if your child develops cold-like symptoms.
You may choose to exercise caution by keeping your child off school:
• If they have had a rough night and have had insufficient sleep with cold symptoms.
• If they have also developed a sneeze and are spreading germs this way.
Your child should stay off school:
• If they have a high temperature alongside cold symptoms
• If they are exhibiting the key signs of the Covid virus – temperature, sore throat, loss of taste – in this
case, you should arrange a Covid-19 test and inform school.

The relevant testing capacity its pillars one and 2 - the other one includes antibody tests -not relevant to those with symptoms so you can see that the system is squashing right up against capacity again. There is a new lab that should come on line in late October I believe but until ag least then it seems likely this situation will continue. I think some kind of priority for test will have to come in again. Children will probably be at the bottom of that if I know this government.

We're dreading getting symptoms as I permanently wfh now and will struggle if the dcs are home all day. Not sure if there are tests near us or slots available as haven't even checked!!

Kids with colds need to be kept off for a couple of days so that it doesn’t go around the school to everyone. Some of the kids who catch it are going to get coughs and need a test, which will turn out negative and could have been avoided if people took a couple of days for a cold.