I'm still here and I've read your responses. I just wanted to say I appreciate that lots of you have looked at what I've posted and gone 'nope.' That's fair enough. There are lots of different opinions on all this and even some hugely well-respected and knowledgeable experts can't agree on certain aspects of the virus so if people don't feel reassured by what I posted then I accept that. I hope things end up being safer than you're all fearing because goodness knows people shouldn't have to feel scared sending their children into school should they? I certainly don't think the government have handled this well, incidentally. If I'm a Tory bot, I'm not going to last long in my job given my opinion of this government.
I will just say this. If someone posts something that you think is utter crap, it's enough to take it down with facts . You then win the argument. I think most people on this thread have been perfectly courteous, by the way, but a couple of posters have resorted to twattery to make their point. I'm thinking of What I don't understand is how wishingchair can be so dim and Wonderful name, OP. I see you sitting in your chair, eyes scrunched up and wishing like mad. I mean, really? I definitely don't expect most posters to have any clue who I am but I am posting repeatedly on other threads on MN with reference to the fact I'm experiencing severe mental health problems right now. Which isn't even actually relevent because basic politeness should be in place in any argument. But it's not necessary is it? We're all feeling fraught at the moment, it should still be possible to argue your case without that kind of thing.
Anyway, lastly....
If you can explain why the virus won't spread with no social distancing, I'm happy to listen???
I think I have a few points in reply to that. One, the virus is at really very low levels in society. There are huge swathes of the country where it's practically non-existent. If the virus isn't in your county, it can't actually spread around your schools. And yes, it might well spread elsewhere and creep into other parts of the country but if contact testing does ok then that spread won't necessarily be exponential. You can call me naive or optimistic saying that but we've had MONTHS of people mixing more and so far no drastic increase in virus numbers/deaths. I'm not sticking my fingers in my ears and going 'it's all going to be fine' while people drop dead around me in the streets - there are lots of reasons to be hopeful.
Two - the thing I first linked to included nurseries, I think? You can't tell me toddlers know how to social distance. The fact that there was minimal spread even in those settings makes me feel optimistic, particularly given some of the children in schools and nurseries were the children of doctors and nurses so likely to have been exposed to the virus. If you don't want to feel any optimism having read that, that's a personal choice. I am going to choose to take comfort from it - my friend's little girl starts nursery soon and so I do have a vested interest in these settings being as safe as possible. I do feel she will be safe. It's still the case that children are staggeringly unlikely to experience serious problems if they actually catch the virus, plus even with this virus around, people of working age are 'only' dying in line with their age group's usual life expectancy (obviously, I don't like the idea of anyone dying, before anyone picks up on that).
Three - Even, worse case scenario, if the virus does spread significantly (I don't think anyone can claim it won't a bit but I'd love to think local lockdowns will prevent it really spiralling) then we seem to be doing better at keeping people alive - you can read all sorts of doctors online saying a much smaller percentage of those who catch the virus are now dying. So if you said to me that schools don't have enough social distancing I'd still like to be optimistic that the consquences won't be that terrible. This is a horrible virus with catastrophic consequences for an unlucky minority but for most it really is not serious, with a news article today saying that in terms of just the last few weeks, 0.3% of people who get the virus are dying (and most of those will be frail and elderly). I know that's a whole debate in itself though and there are a million other threads where you can wrangle with that point of view to your heart's content.
Anyway, I am going to leave it there. Not really hoping to change anyone's mind at this point, I only wanted to post up the first link I did because I genuinely hoped it might reassure a few people. But it's annoying when an OP doesn't come back to the thread so I did want to respond.