AIBU about childminder

[mammajulie]

AIBU about childminder?

last week for a message saying a few children in the setting had Hand Foot and Mouth and said if children were displaying symptoms then to keep them off until spots had scabbed over and they were feeling well enough to join in normal activities. Anyway a few days later she sent me some pictures of my son with a few spots, anyway I picked him up and he had a few. Has been absolutely fine in himself all week but has had 3 days off. Due back Monday all things well. Is this standard? I’m sure nhs says you don’t have to stay away from childcare etc.

Also I’ve since seen via social media she took 3 children to the zoo yesterday, saying they were unexpected quiet and took some children for a treat. Is this not a slap in the face for me when I’ve had to take 3 days off work and he’s not even ill?

it’s not exactly treating all children equally is it?

YABU because it is her policy which you agreed to when signing your child up.

HF&M is very contagious, I would hope you wouldn’t want to risk passing that on to other young children just as you wouldn’t want your child being deliberately exposed to it if it was known in advance?

Most nurseries have their own exclusion period & you agree when you sign up. Ours is 3 days for HF&M, 48 hours for sickness etc. Yep most of the time my child is totally fine immediately after being sick but the 48 exclusion policy is to keep other kids safe and it’s what I agreed to.

Is it the norm that you still have to pay even when the CM has excluded a child due to sickness policies? It doesn’t seem fair.

She's done the right thing. Presumably you have signed a contract and seen her policies when you signed. It's great she isn't lax about sickness. Your child might be fine with hfm but there will be others who aren't.

It will be in your contract and yes it would be unusual to not pay for your child's sickness. She's still open for business but your child is unable to attend. Of course if she closes cause she's ill then she shouldn't charge.

You do realise it's not a childminding job to care for an ill child. That's a paediatric nurse. Childminding insurance wouldn't cover her if she knowingly cared for a sick child and something happened to the child in her care. A sick child should be at home or if necessary in a hospital. Not a childcare setting.

Childminder can’t exactly magic up hfm, so I don’t think there is more to it. Perhaps the zoo made sense due to numbers but purely coincidental.

Yes - nurseries and CMs almost exclusively do charge when children are excluded due to illness

Yes of course it's fair.

The world is going crazy!

That isn’t the nhs guidance though

I caught HFM from my toddler, who wasn’t ill with it. Sadly I was pregnant in my 1st trimester, DC was born with a congenital abnormality and HFM cannot be ruled out as the cause.

Be prepared to be finding a new childminder, you knew the policy, signed up, start complaining and refusing to pay and you’ll be asked to remove your child.

Yes it is - it's exactly the NHS guidance.

"Keep your child off school or nursery while they're feeling too unwell to go.
But as soon as they're feeling better, they can go back to school or nursery. There's no need to wait until all the blisters have healed.
Keeping your child away from other children for longer is unlikely to stop the illness spreading."

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/hand-foot-mouth-disease/

The NHS advice is explicitly clear that you should only keep your child off if they're too unwell to go, they can go back as soon as they feel better, that there's no need to wait until the blisters have healed and it's unlikely to stop the illness spreading.

Yes, because they don’t have another child who turns up off the street to do those 2 days.

Childminders can set their own policies, the NHS doesn't have power over them. If OP doesnt like it she is free to find alternative childcare.

Which doesn't change the fact that this is the NHS policy.

I said a fact about this condition.

They said "that's not the NHS policy".

I proved that it is, in fact, the NHS policy.

You're now saying it doesn't matter whether it's the NHS policy... Why didn't you say that to the poster who brought up the NHS policy?

Yes, the childminder policy can be different to the NHS policy but I'm not the one who dragged the NHS policy into it, am I?

The fact is, the childminder's policy doesn't prevent the spread of the illness. She can still have it, she still does have it - but it's doesn't actually made any scientific or medical sense.

I didn't say the NHS did overrule, did I?

Why did they bring up the NHS policy?

It’s ridiculous that anyone has suggested that the CM should lose income because she’s followed a perfectly sensible sickness policy which is designed to protect children in her care. It is even more ridiculous that you think it’s not fair on you to have to pay. How would it be fair on the childminder if you didn’t?

Yes because she can't offer a place to someone else to pay her bills. I've always used CM and you pay for your own absences for illness and holidays.

Tbh my CM have never excluded for HFM because it's not guidance to do so but if she has a policy then that's that. You can't argue with it. Tbh my youngest kid was very uncomfortable with HFM so I kept her off anyway. Some kids are quite poorly with it and perhaps she doesn't have capacity to care for several kids who are quite out of sorts with it.

Of course it’s the norm!
Why should the childminder lose income because your kid is ill?
God I’m glad I’m not your childminder!

Lots of illnesses are contagious before there are signs and symptoms, such as chicken pox but it doesn't mean we allow them in with the disease.

Chicken pox is most contagious when the blisters are present until they've scabbed over. That is why the advice and guidance all says to isolate for that time.

HFMD is most contagious before the blisters are present and remains contagious for weeks afterwards. That's why the advice and guidance all says not to bother isolating for that time.

That's the difference. Not allowing in with chicken pox blisters will reduce the spread. Not allowing in with HFMD blisters won't stop the spread. That's why the guidance is different for the two conditions.

One of those policies makes medical, scientific, logical sense and the other one doesn't.

She can have whatever policy she likes but pretending this a reasonable, rational, science-backed, informed policy is nonsense. It isn't.

YABU.

She's trying her best not to knowingly infect mindees, herself or her family. It doesnt matter that they are 'less contagious' than before the spots appeared. She isn't able to prefict the future but she can do something about it once the illness is clear. Do you want to knowingly expose yourself to a disease? Which would then mean you get ill yourself, have to close and then dont get paid by any of the families (and they have to find alternate childcare)? Surely the most sensible thing to do is to ask the sick child to stay at home.

Anyway thankfully the NHS GUIDANCE isn't my employer because I won't be told to look after a sick child by anyone.

Calm down love

It doesn't matter what the nhs say she's self employed and sets her own policies.

hf&m can be extremely dangerous to adults.