To think this class should be closed?

[Jenster03]

I'm a part time primary teacher and in the space of two weeks, 14 children have tested positive out of 30 in my class.
We've had 2 or 3 return in that time, but more and more are testing positive. Now my teaching assistant has it.
AIBU to think we should be sending the class home and remote learning? How would you feel if you were a parent of a child in my class?
Oh, and I'm pretty anxious about my level of exposure too!

Better that they all contract it and get over it. I'm pretty happy that my children have all contracted it now. It's the vaccinated who will now have to face the winter with a compromised immune system and will have to deal with flu and the new delta plus variant.
Half term will be a little fire break.

@starlight13

Better that they all contract it and get over it. I'm pretty happy that my children have all contracted it now. It's the vaccinated who will now have to face the winter with a compromised immune system and will have to deal with flu and the new delta plus variant. Half term will be a little fire break.

It's not better that all the staff contract it, though. Some will die, and others have long Covid, even vaccinated. Teachers aren't a breed apart.

I am also confused on who will teach all the kids when half the staff are off sick. Ratios are not optional.

@CherryBlossomWinter

Of course you should send the class home. Your instincts are totally right. They all need to self isolate for up to two weeks and do remote learning in that time.

Public Health are absolutely crazy not to advise you to do this. Read about the Irish school that have gone onto remote learning for two weeks, as they also have not had adequate advice.

I’m a medical professional. Vaccinations are a big part of the control of the pandemic, but they won’t work on their own. Children do get ill, do transmit to others (leading to breakthrough serious cases), do get long covid, do sometimes get seriously ill.

It is not a good strategy by any means to just ‘herd immunity’ children in schools. Reducing cases is extremely important still

• by mitigations within school (mostly ventilation, HEPA filters, masks) greatly reduce transmission.
• by sending close contacts of a positive case home (= the whole class) for testing for at least a week.

The best strategy is as soon as a child tests positive, for the whole class to switch to online learning for 5 days, and then daily antigen tests for another week. That is the very least to be done, and is quite an effective way of reducing transmission.

This is so wise, but the complex planning required is beyond this govt's black and white thinking. Such a pity the complexity cannot be grappled with still and they prefer to train people to accept, rather than manage and realistically fight, all manner of hardship and harm. But the British establisment thinking is so hard to change.

@ClaudiasWinkleMan

I think all education staff should quit and get nice lower risk jobs because we just need to live with it. Is that seriously what a lot of you are suggesting? Just take a breath and have a think about that. We have a chronic recruitment and retainment issue in education. I’ve never known moral so low. Excellent teachers are leaving the profession because it just isn’t work the hassle anymore. It’s such a thankless job. It’ll be great when it gets to the point where we have 60+ to a classroom or kids options at GCSE are reduced because there just aren’t teachers anymore. All schools want are the same mitigation’s office and shop staff get. Ventilation, masks and better hygiene. But there is none of that. After healthcare and social care workers, teachers are the most likely to get long Covid. We’ve lost staff to it. So to all those educators being told to get a less risky job, let’s do it. Let’s down tools and see what happens. These parents will have to figured it out, maybe they’ll teach their kids instead as it’s clearly a doddle.

I'm a parent and I'd support teachers striking over their unacceptably high exposure to very high viral doses of covid. (I'm hoping some teachers will take some co2 monitors into school to get some real data to hammer the government with).

In addition to everything else, it's sending a terrible message to the kids, that their teachers aren't worthy of respect and consideration.

disposableusername
No one will. That has happened at ours. We've had to close the school and there are no zooms as the teachers have covid and are sick. Kids will miss out on their learning completely now but some will expect teachers to be zooming from their beds. I'm sure they see us as robots not worthy of sick days or basic rights.

The problem is Government guidelines, We have parents testing positive but the children are still being sent to school. The children then catch covid and they are then kept at home. If bothers or sisters are not positive they are still being sent to school . Then they catch it. It should be the rule that if one person in the household tests positive the rest of that household should isolate. Those in a class where there is a child that has tested positive the rest of the class should be encouraged to be tested as well.

My sons are at weekly boarding school, on Sunday DS1 tested positive but DS2 negative. The school said guidelines were to send DS2 straight back. Which I did. A week later and the whole dorm have it plus various (double vaccinated staff and parents) it’s a 💩 show but so long as guidelines are that siblings of positive kids still go to school, this will continue.
This week I have heard of A LOT of people I know personally who have been double vac’d but have now got Covid.
We are too casual with PPA here, in Spain the PPA is still taken very seriously, including children wearing it.

Is that going to be the Go To resolution for everything. When there’s a severe flu outbreak next winter will we send all our kids home?

Are any of the kids in the class ending up in hospital? Are any of them dying? No? Then they should be off sick if they’re ill and back when they’ve recovered. As has been the norm for many years.

Being vaccinated does not stop spread, only reduces symptoms. I was the only double jabbed in my house - still took it home and gave it to everyone else. Except my son, who is unvaccinated.

Could we have the Herman Cain awards started on mumsnet because I think they are required for the uneducated anti vax covid is a cold people here in the U.K.

I know a 42 year old, double jabbed man with no health problems who has been hospitalised with Covid. It’s not a case of moving on. We still need to be protecting ourselves and others.

@Moll2020

You cannot be fined. All fines have been suspended.

Have you got a current link to confirm this?

I expected it to tag @Moll2020

@ImUninsultable

There us no point.

Covid is not going away. This is life now. We just need to accept that we are now living in a world with a virus that is mostly fine with a vaccine but sometimes people will get very ill or die. It's not nice, but its how we lived for a couple thousand years before modern medicine. And it's just how we need to live now.

It isnt going away. People die every year from the flu and we dont shut down. With a vaccine now, it isnt like it was back at the start.

If you dont want to live with the risk then maybe consider a career change.

I know a lot of people agree with this but I can't get my head around it. Other countries are doing much better than us because they have continued wearing masks (which even young schoolchildren wear in much smaller and spread out classes), social distancing, vaccine passports. Our country stands out like a sore thumb with rocketing cases and thousands of deaths every single week.

How has this happened? Why are so many people satisfied with settling for so little? Even if people think they won't get covid, it still has a knock on because hospitals are already too full to cope with other health needs and emergencies.

We've not just ignored even trying for zero covid, we've completely abandoned all measures, including sending even family members of positive cases into schools etc at the same time as any protection at all for the extremely vulnerable is also abandoned.

I can't understand the logic. Even ignoring all the preventable deaths and suffering from long covid, it's such a waste of time, money and resources.

What am I missing? Do people here really hate wearing masks and other measures that much? Why do other countries get on fine with it but we can't? Or is it more that we've become desensitised to it and don't realise how badly we're doing in comparison?

In my youngest dd class (year 1) there are currently 12 off with this horrendous cold/cough/flu thing. Me and another 2 of my daughters now have it. Burning up hacking cough feel like head is in vice, whole body is in agony its worse that any illness I've had before, LF and PCR is negative as are other members of class so not covid. For a moment I was annoyed my daughter spent days in this class when the kids were dropping like flys just waiting for it to hit our house too but then what is the alternative! We can't keep opening/closing schools for every illness (including covid) and I feel like it's because we were all isolated for so long its hit so hard.

Whilst we do need to get on with it, most people in offices wouldn't be happy to have to work in close proximity to dozens of people with covid.

I hate to say it but we have to live with it... yeah it sucks that people are dying, but we can’t hideaway forever... not only that but sending kids home has knock on effect... you send kids home to remote learn, parents have to take time off, which leads to in some cases unemployment... imagine you have to send the healthy ones home, they don’t catch it so the parents are taking 10 days off... they go back to school, catch it and that’s another 10 days + you have to take off... people have to make a living aswell... we learned to live with the flu, people still die from that. It’s not ideal but we really have got to move on and deal with it...

@DeborahAnnabel

Is that going to be the Go To resolution for everything. When there’s a severe flu outbreak next winter will we send all our kids home?

Are any of the kids in the class ending up in hospital? Are any of them dying? No? Then they should be off sick if they’re ill and back when they’ve recovered. As has been the norm for many years.

It actually is. If there is an outbreak of say Norovirus in schools and there are many cases. The school will shut for a deep clean for a few days. It isn't often it happens but for outbreaks it does happen.

I am a school attendance officer.

@theemperorhasnoclothes

Also, what we're doing is actively increasing our disabled population at a fast rate. The number of people who are double jabbed who still haven't recovered after a few months is high.

As well as being morally bankrupt, it doesn't even make economic sense. Unless you're a disaster capitalist.

Not only that, but these increased unbridled levels of infection are allowing the virus to mutate. Delta has already just now developed a variant that is beginning to be "of interest". The idea that we should just learn to live with it conveniently ignores the aspect that more people living with it could ultimately lead to more people dying with it.

I love the royal 'we' from loads of people who don't regularly get exposed to covid sufferers without the benefit of ppe.

My DD’s school (high school) has 40 kids off with it. They have been told to wear masks whilst moving between lessons for the rest of the week.

We are wearing masks in Wales and our case rates are worse, basically doing most of the plan b from England. It's not some easy. Cure all

I think the approach used here recently is asking them to all be tested is better - when we bad an outbreak lots did this isolated and now are back in with a full contingent almost

So if we don't learn to live with it what's the other alternative? Because I can't think of a single one I have to say with the exception of indefinite lockdowns

Are the children symptomatic out of interest? I have a receptioner and another just in nursery and we are getting SO many illnesses at the moment and I’m wondering if we’d notice Covid amongst all the other non Covid illnesses!