Chicken pox - when to allow visitors?

[SkiYesPlease]

Hi All,
Just wondered when it's ok to allow visitors round the house. LO has had chicken pox now for 9days. All spots have crusted over and a handful of the scabs have healed and dropped off leaving a faint pink mark. We'd organised a get together with friends early next week and i'm wondering as a mother/father when would you let your child come in contact with someone who has had chickenpox?
HPA states that kids with chickenpox can return to nursery/school after 5 days for after spots have appeared but that doesn't seem long enough to me but then i'm not sure what is long enough?
Any thoughts much appreciated.

At our school the advice is that all spots have to be crusted over and no new spots are appearing.

I expect your visitors will be fine, but I would still let them know your son is recovering from cp, so that when they see his healing spots they don't get worried.

Thanks for your reply dikker, I'd already informed friends about chickenpox and received a mixed response hence the post to see what others thought about it.

I found out about the 5 day exclusion period recommended by the HPA yesterday. My son has CP and has been off school for a week. Some of his spots still have blisters on but he has been well in himself since the weekend, so, after checking with the school, he went back today.

I think in your case, all you can do is let the parents know about the HPA guidelines, and let them judge for themselves. Some parents want their children to be in contact with CP while they are still young as the disease can be much more serious in an older person. I was grateful my son finally caught it as he is 10 years old.

Of course, a lot would depend also on how your LO has been with the illness. None of my older children actually felt ill with CP, and my 10 yo only felt ill for the day before the spots came out, and the next 2 days. But if your child has been quite unwell, then maybe they won't feel up to socialising so soon?

Fortunately LO has been fine with it and constantly asking for his friends so i think she'll be over the moon to be in the company of others. I was hoping we could get back to our usual routine after the weekend and go back to our classes and playgroups, (i've checked their policy and all of them have responded with 'if the spots have scabbed it's fine'). My thoughts were:

1. We're passed the HPA guideline of 5 days
2. The spots have already scabbed and are starting to fall off
3. It will be over 12 days since the onset of the rash

since some friends think it's too soon to visit, i'm now thinking is it too soon to go back to our playgroups?

If the spots are all scabbed over you are fine to go back to playgroups :)