Would you make your primary age child isolate from the rest of the house?

[Oileo]

Obviously presuming households with no additional clinical vulnerabilities or elderly relatives or risks.

I was online earlier with my son and a child mentioned they couldn’t do something as they have to isolate in their bedroom. I asked the mum by text, thinking it was a mix up, but she confirmed that her 8 yr old has a positive case in their school bubble (Keyworker parents, not though with health) so is isolating away from siblings/ parents in her bedroom. I know it’s certainly not her class’s first period off in isolation, so recently they have spent nearly a month in their room alone.

Tbf I luckily haven’t been in this position myself, but I guess I’d presumed households just mainly stayed in together and that’s what I’d planned to do if we had a positive contact. I can’t imagine not hugging or being close to my 8 yr old for over a week. Being practical we also all share bedrooms and have one bathroom anyway. The child seemed ok in themselves.

Yabu- yes, if our kids have had cases in their bubble they’ve stayed in their room alone for the period

Yanbu-we let them move around the house as normal

No, but I would try to keep him away from his brother who is CEV.

Are you in Scotland? The instructions are seemingly stricter in Scotland.

DS was told to self isolate within the home (primary age) and the instructions were emailed to us that he should isolate in his bedroom if possible and not use family rooms. He did and loved it. Fortnite, Disney Plus, Lego and his iPad whenever he liked without mum making him get off the screens and spend time with the family. Room service was top notch in Hotel AvoidingNextdoorNeighbour too.

No, children shouldn't have to isolate from their whole household, although my teenager would be perfectly happy to.
Both my sons have had 2 weeks self isolating. That meant they stayed in our house or garden.
However, neither time was the positive child a very close contact (whole year group isolated). I might have been a little more cautious then, or if my own child tested positive.
I would definitely never imprison an 8 year old though.
Do you think her parents have misunderstood? She doesn't have to isolate from her family.

Absolutely not. It's utterly cruel to isolate a non-symptomatic, low carrier risk child of a young age away from their family when they've already been cut off physically from pretty much everyone else.

Even when we've had norovirus visit our home, whoever is in 'quarantine' with the notable exception of me has my company with exemplary hygiene practices to stop the spread through the home (which has a pretty decent success rate).

There are very few exceptions where I think this would be appropriate. Even in Jamjar77's example which is understandable, that wasn't during a pandemic where social isolation had already been inflicted on them prior to chicken pox.

Dear god no. That’s just cruel. I might take a different view if the child was actually COVID positive, but probably not.

Absolutely not. Covid is real and dangerous but we're running the risk of losing all sense of proportion in it's name.

Not a chance. If it came to it we would isolate as a household.

No I think it’s quite awful to do that; I wouldn’t do it if they had symptoms either; I think unless someone in your house is elderly or cev then it’s unreasonable and even then I’d suggest the adult is the one to isolate rather than the child.

Surely it’s just a case of making an individual assessment of what works for your family and child. Any reduction in time spent together reduces viral load. Some children would be quite happy getting on with their work in their room and other’s wouldn’t cope.

An 8 year old? For a month? That's bordering on abusive in my opinion

@HarrietPotterska

An 8 year old? For a month? That's bordering on abusive in my opinion

It's not bordering on, it absolutely is abusive. No question about it.

This country is losing any form of common sense. Before the whole covid thing if someone said they'd shut their child in their room for 10 days only taking them meals, they'd have been reported to social services, and rightly so.

Absolutely not. I would isolate from my family if necessary as an adult, but I wouldn’t expect the dc to.

Horrendous. What on earth has happened to people that they think this is remotely OK and reasonable?

No it’s ridiculous and if you consider it logically, fairly futile. If they became symptomatic then you would need to have close contact with them to provide medical care anyway....so what’s the point?

I don’t believe that’s appropriate for a child of that age.

I think it's awful.
I had COVID back in oct, no social distancing within house (2 young kids) and no one else caught it.
DH had it end of dec - same again, no one else caught it.

Side note: it did make me wonder about this 'spreading like wildfire through households and bubbles' as we also have a childcare bubble with parents neither of whom have caught it both times me and husband have.

Some children would be quite happy getting on with their work in their room and other’s wouldn’t cope.

This isn’t a case of getting on with their schoolwork in their room. It’s essentially locking them in a room for weeks from when they get up to when the go to sleep. That’s very different.

No never..its a hideous idea.

No, that's awful. I have a 7 year old and this would destroy him. Maybe the kid doesn't mind, but mine certainly would.

My SD (10) tested positive mid December and we decided then to isolate as a family. Turned out DD20months and my partner had already been caught it off her by the time we got the result and made the decision anyway.

Not sure how it works in the UK but here in Denmark you call a number and a (in our case) very nice person talks you through the options and when your 'release dates' are with family isolation.

I'm still trying to work out how DD woke me up from a nap together by coughing heavily into my open mouth and still didn't infect me though...

I think it depends on the 8 year old, and the others in the house. You may be able to have him or her move around the house and maintain a distance etc.

It's not abusive don't be ridiculous. God that word is thrown around on MN like confetti.

Each family will need to decide what's right for them and their children which will depends on the child, their age, and who else is in the household and how at risk they are. If I had another CEV child for example, I would probably want the exposed child to isolate.

No. I have an 8 year old and a 10 year old and they both have had periods of isolation due to contact recently. Dd’s included Christmas Day!

We carried on life as normal. Tried to encourage additional hand washing and told the kids not to lick each other (they have just invented a game called “puppies”) but other than that just got on with our lives.

If one of them had got ill then I would have had a bit of a re-think - probably along the lines of splitting the house two and two - one parent with the ill child and one with the well child.

I can't imagine doing this. My 9yo cried for over half of our walk time yesterday, about how awful lockdown was. Meanwhile, there is no bloody way I would leave my (only slightly less touchy-feely) 12yo alone for days: the internet is absolutely not the same as non-stop television in the old days!

As for isolating myself, I don't think they would tolerate that, either! mummymummymummymummy

YANBU.

We would absolutely not do this. DD is isolating at the moment due to a case in her keyworker group and we are just acting as normal (apart from her not leaving the house of course). There is no way I'd shut a primary aged child away on their own for ten days.

Even if they were positive themselves. If we catch it then so be it, we'd be isolating anyway so no risk to anyone else. Can you imagine having a poorly child and shutting them away on their own? Not a chance.