Telegraph reporting primary schools to return 1 June

[MummaGiles]

www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/05/02/primary-schools-reopen-june-part-blueprint-unlock-britain/

Sorry it’s behind a paywall.

Just heard about this on the radio. They are suggesting that Johnson will address the country next Sunday (10/5) with the roadmap, part of which will be primary schools returning on 1 June.

Not saying I believe it, just sharing the link.

@Alpacca The government will say any teacher who is pregnant or vulnerable has to go into work and teach classes of 30. The shielded group is a much smaller group of people and being pregnant or having diabetes for example does not put you in the shielded group. If you are pregnant and have a serious cardiac condition, you will be in the shielded group.
I don't agree with this by the way, but anyone vulnerable or pregnant will be treated like any staff member. Even though we keep being told that people who die have underlying conditions.

@ToffeeYoghurt playing Devils advocate here but what if schools went back early to generate some more spread to keep the curve flattened so we can manage a second wave during the summer / early autumn.

I just don't know how our already fragile school communities could deal if a staff member or, god forbid, a child died as a result of this decision.

@cantory exactly where have I been disingenuous? It is exactly what the EDEC said and Jenny Harries has indicated. The is every chance Primary Schools will be part of that.

I have put up the document as well I hate putting too much in threads and prefer to look at source documents. People can and should read it and make their own minds up

@pfrench I would do the same if I was you.
You have to look after your own family.

THe EDEC document also covers pregnancy and has some good graphs for what underlying conditions have been seen

I recommend reading it - and then making up your own mind

@Quartz2208 You are being disingenuous as there are two larger pieces of research in China and Germany that say children catch covid 19 at the same rate as adults, but that children tend to have very mild symptoms.
And that fits with what people in the lungs thread say where they talk about feeling really ill, but their child having a sore throat for a few days, or a temperature for a day or two, or a bit of a cough.

I suspect it's true and deliberately leaked to press to see public reaction.

I hope any return is voluntary and not all at once. Though can always develop a cough.

The government will say any teacher who is pregnant or vulnerable has to go into work and teach classes of 30. The shielded group is a much smaller group of people and being pregnant or having diabetes for example does not put you in the shielded group. If you are pregnant and have a serious cardiac condition, you will be in the shielded group.I don't agree with this by the way, but anyone vulnerable or pregnant will be treated like any staff member. Even though we keep being told that people who die have underlying conditions.

It’s a tricky one. Many schools can’t actually open and staff safely without the vulnerable staff.

I mean shielding. We have 4 teachers in my school. 1 is shielding as is in the severe risk category, another has diabetes and asthma and another is in her 3rd trimester. That leaves me.

Logistically, it's a nightmare but ethically it's even worse.

My husband is also supposed to be shielding... just don't know how I would live with myself if I brought the virus home from school and he got infected. Collateral damage, I suppose.

@cantory it isnt about whether children catch it at all. Its about whether having caught it they transmit it to others. Two very different things. In our household myself and DD had far worse potential symptoms than DS and DH

And its not me saying it its the EDEC

Last week they were kite flying 11th May to soften people up for 1st June. Now they’re saying full open 1st June to soften people up for a phased return.

@KoalasandRabbit It will in effect be voluntary because it is so easy to pretend that your child has symptoms. If they were doing testing it would be different, but they are not.
I want to see much lower rates of deaths before I would consider sending my kids back. The rate of deaths has went down, but it is still high.

If they were doing mass testing and I knew there were few cases where I lived I would also send them back. But there is none.

I’ll believe it when I see it

Yep, what noblegiraffe said.

@Quartz2208 It depends. If you have a vulnerable child then whether they catch it is an issue.
But for healthy children the issue is them passing the virus onto adults.

The media, particularly the Times and the Telegraph have behaved fucking appallingly in all of this. Shame on them and their shitty journalists.

Yes, years 5 and 6,10 and 12.

BBC Paper reviewers tonight suggesting it’s just another newspaper flying a kite.

Why year 5?

Sorry if I'm being thick, what does "flying a kite" mean in this instance? Trying to gauge public reaction?

Mr Johnson may well be hoping to announce that schools will reopen to all pupils on 1st June but he may also be hoping to see pigs fly.

If schools are safe to fully reopen on 1st June then what's to stop people from going away for half-term? Can the hospitals in Cornwall cope with an influx of city-dwellers coming for half-term? Or with the aftermath? I'm only a lowly teacher and am not in charge of the decision about when to reopen but given the effects of reopening schools elsewhere in Europe aren't fully known, and none has reopened in full, it seems improbable that England's schools will be ready to do so by June 1st. The original shielding date was about 12th June so I'm imagining full reopening won't be before then because many schools were struggling with staffing once the highly vulnerable groups were identified. I want to be back at school but I want it to be safe for the children I teach, for the staff and for those we all come into contact with including my DH (another teacher) and my DCs. In my home the four of us attend four different schools daily. That's a lot of potential for cross contamination all at once and surely the scientists advising the government will need to be happy that a full reopening is reasonably safe. Especially if the current advice that school staff don't need PPE remains...

@Alpacca Only the teacher in the severe shielding category will be officially allowed to stay off. Having diabetes, asthma or being pregnant will I suspect be ignored. I don't know what they will do about anyone living with people in the severe shielding category. I suspect they will say you have to go back and socially distance at home.

All I can say is speak to your union, and put your family first.

@Wehttam A second lockdown just as we hit heatwave weather?

It wouldn't work in any event to flatten a curve. Lockdown lifts too soon we almost immediately see huge increases in cases (and deaths). The impact in the economy would be devastating. Half the workforce could all be off sick at the same time, weeks at a time, no NHS capacity for anything because of sheer numbers of patients and ill (or dead) HCP. Far better to hold off a little longer until cases have died down more. It also buys us time. Aside from work progressing well so far with vaccines, several drugs trials look promising (with early treatment).

In France it's voluntary. And 5-7 year olds to begin with.