To keep my child from school

[immigrant002]

Email from school with confirmed cases of strep a ! Would you keep your child at home in this case ? Not really sure what to do

@2tired2bewitty why on earth do you imagine it’s the same school?!

Yes, no fuss. One Tuesday morning and the other this morning. The criteria is temp plus sore throat and swollen glands.

Well, obviously it probably isn’t, though our school has just sent out an email saying the same thing, and I imagine they say similar things (ours has a letter from the Health Security Agency attached).

But as others have said, you can’t panic and keep them off every time something goes round, much as I’d love to when D&V is involved.

There are 7 confirmed cases in DC's school, both mine are going in. I'm keeping a close eye on them, of course, especially DS as he is allergic to penicillin, but they've missed enough school already.

This has been hyped up by the media a lot and people are scared. There’s scarlet fever in my child’s class and I’m not keeping him at home.
AND he has previously been very ill because of strep..
A few years ago he got very tired and then dark brown urine like cola. He got very poorly overnight. His kidney function was failing and he was diagnosed with post streptococcal glomerulonephritis, basically damage to the small filters in the kidneys, caused by a strep throat infection two weeks previous. (Which we were told was a virus and we were not swabbed or given antibiotics)
He was vey unwell for a month and it took a long time for his kidneys to go back to normal.
Had he been correctly diagnosed with strep throat in the first place, antibiotics would have prevented all of this misery for us all. It was a scary time.

my point is, he is still going to school as normal, now that I know to push for a strep swab if he has symptoms.
Parents just need to be aware of the symptoms. Scarlet fever and strep throat are common and usually cause no issues.
For some people they do, so just be aware and contact the GP when you have symptoms.
It IS treatable with antibiotics, if diagnosed at the correct time.
Try not to panic.

Why did you have to phone 111 if you were only 20th?

Of course not. This isn't a new or unusual thing.

I wouldn’t. You can get antibiotics to treat Strep fairly easily - example my sister in law got it for DN from an independant pharmacist at 10pm. But it does depend on where you live. If you aren’t close to a GP / pharmacy / hospital I’d keep them home

I don’t understand where the hysteria is coming from. Strep A has been about forever. I’d imagine the main reason it’s causing extra issues is because children were not being exposed to it during lock down. We are constantly being exposed to low viral loads of viruses which then builds immunity, during lock down, children were not.

All you need to do is wash your child’s hands and keep cuts clean. As an extra precaution, if temp isn’t coming down with nurofen/paracetamol then call the GP and ask for some antibiotics as soon as possible.

I've also had an email saying there are cases at the school but I won't be keeping them off, dd and I both had Strep and Scarlet fever a couple of years ago, it wasn't pleasant but I know what to look out for and antibiotics clear it up.

Nine children have died
Countless more are in ICU
The ambulance service is just about to go on strike
The nurses are walking out and won't even be covering A&E
The GPs are stretched well beyond capacity checking every single child and are now on an emergency footing in some areas
They are running low on liquid antibiotics in some areas

Why the fuck wouldn't a parent be worried about all of this??
You would have to be entirely foolish to not feel concerned!

Not to mention the SPEED that a child goes downhill, from being mildly unwell with a run of the mill cold like symptoms to serious illness/death.

A child of a consultant died, do you suppose he didn't know what to look for interview? He is a doctor ffs. That tells you everything you need to know.

If you want to pretend this is all fine, nothing to see here, then go ahead but don't minimise and pretend that this is nothing to worry about, because of course it is extremely worrying to most parents.

Exactly this.

Some posters on this thread just want an excuse to make the OP feel silly for being concerned and to make themselves feel superior. It’s embarrassing (for them).

I’m hugely more concerned for this than I ever was for Covid.

Absolutely not. The worst thing that happened in the pandemic was that children were kept away from school / schools were closed. We now know how disastrous this was. Don't fall for media nonsense and just send your child to school as usual.

The respiratory professer Ds is under shared this video yesterday from a consultant. It’s sensible, none panic driven advice. m.youtube.com/watch?v=Qf-lgDwO8fA&fbclid=IwAR3MyuRhrgEB1cKwD7i-xHFOdOEa7e7OzjBBNGuNtmnIntwj26HifdlV7Hs

ds is older than most being hit badly but is clinically vulnerable with a couple of conditions so we are always careful at this time of year and are carrying on being so. You can’t live your life in fear of what may be.

OP, do what feels right for you and for your child. The truth is, shall something happen, it will be your problem, not someone else’s. I’m still keeping my children at school, but there are no cases reported and also they have had a very strong immunity so far. Follow your instincts.

Are you planning on staying at home until after it passes? Unless you're going to stop mixing with others completely a few more days of school is unlikely to make a difference as to whether they catch Strep.
Personally I'm just making myself aware of the symptoms and carrying on.

The parents who are keeping children off from dds school (school have emailed saying no cases), are taking them out and about. A few went to soft play together today - we were invited, that’s how I know. They didn’t know dd was still in school as I haven’t spoken to them about this.

Which makes no sense at all - keep them off school but have them all mixing together as usual anyway at a soft play? Not my circus, not my moneys so didn’t say a word even though it makes zero sense.

I’m not sure. School is now on wind-down to xmas and mostly playing games / doing busy work, we break up in a week. So literally we are just there for the social life. There are several confirmed cases in our year group and many more untested absences with parents claiming that their children’s sore throat and fever is ‘just a cold’.

If I could take a week unauthorised absence without upsetting the school I’d do it, but I need them to write a reference for my child soon and I want it to say we’re epic 😬 I’ll be reflecting on all this over the next day or so but we might bunk off for health reasons yes. We certainly won’t be at the last day, which is always a whole school assembly where they sing a lot, they literally couldn’t get any better at spreading respiratory diseases 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Why on earth would the OP’s school have the exact same email as your school?!

The letter I got from school definitely says “confirmed”

I would keep my child off if there was a confirmed case, absolutely. I don't have health anxiety

People are acting like strep a is a new thing. I think the media need to stop whipping people into a frenzy. We have it at our school so obvs will be vigilant of any symptoms but won't be keeping her off.

@BirdyWoof

I am medical and have worked on an infectious diseases ward for many years.I have looked after many patients with Strep A related illnesses.

It is not to look superior, it’s to stop fear mungering. I think encouraging hysteria is far more embarrassing.