Child in DD class has Covid-19

[Vestandpants]

He’s tested positive on Friday, poor thing is feeling so poorly.

They only went back on Thursday so I’m wondering if he picked it up beforehand?

Anyway, I’m to keep our DD off for 14 days now.
My question is do I have to stay off work?
I genuinely can’t afford the bills if I have to stay off as my work don’t pay me if I’m off.

Should I just go to work and only take time off if my own DD shows symptoms (very tempted)

Help!

The Radleys Primary School It say a suspected case so not even confirmed positive! I thought nothing happened until a positive test result??

Blinking heck Grow that’s nuts, it doesn’t feel proportionate at all.

Sorry misread so they (radleys) have a staff problem. This makes more sense to me. However am surprised that supply staff is not a possibility I think that is what our school is planning in this scenario.

Some schools have very little budget for supply teachers. Maybe they don't want to use it all up in the first week of term!

Yes and also you couldn't run the whole ks2 on supply staff alone I would imagine.

@Frazzled2207
And also a basic common sense issue at that school.
What on earth were the school thinking in allowing all of the KS2 teachers to come into close contact so that one case has taken them all out of action. Honestly the head teacher of such a school deserves to be fired for gross misconduct as they have clearly acted negligently and completely against guidelines in such a way that has needlessly effected the education of hundreds of children.

I think it's because gov guidance is so useless.

• Bubbles should have been as small as possible. Primary should not have been allowed to do year groups. 120 is ridiculous primary age they will all be off waiting results.
• Dfe guidance should have been online staff meeting only. I doubt many companies are doing meetings which could shut a whole company.

If 1/2000 are positive thats say 250 teachers (i think it's over a week though could be daily). And 4000 students. 4250/39000 schools is 10%. And that is without other school staff. And i guess there are maybe 7 year groups per school

[quote StatisticalSense]@Frazzled2207
And also a basic common sense issue at that school.
What on earth were the school thinking in allowing all of the KS2 teachers to come into close contact so that one case has taken them all out of action. Honestly the head teacher of such a school deserves to be fired for gross misconduct as they have clearly acted negligently and completely against guidelines in such a way that has needlessly effected the education of hundreds of children.[/quote]
I don’t get why all teachers needed to be together either.

The priority should have been smallest groups of students in class together mixing
Above
The staggered starts as parents are outside.
and Over issues with kids mixing outside at breaks
Packed lunches in classrooms or outside and school dinners in canteen.

minimum paperwork coming from schools

Masks for teachers

Schools will have had inset days before opening so all staff together for meetings. However, they should have been SD

Thing is some HT like posters on here will think the risks are low. Only x people get it.
Dont realise it is airborne etc as the focus from gov is on hands.
I mean you read the letters and it's like it will all be fine. Just send your kids in even though there are positive cases in the school with siblings of isolating still going.
Maybe people would feel better if contacts were actually tested

I was made to feel silly when questioned why teachers themselves are mixing within bubbles. I get that the logistics makes it harder, but this is bound to happen often unless teachers remain distant from each other.

@titchy

No you don't have to isolate OP. I think some posters need a refresher course in the rules

It sounds like the school however could have been a bit clearer in their messaging and told parents that only the children need to isolate and avoided some of the Facebook kicking off. Although if the children in question are KS1 maybe they're kicking off because they'll have to stay at home to look after them?

I mean, people could just stop being arseholes and not kick off because of their own misinformed views.

I believe (I'm not sure) that proximity contacts of positive cases do have to SI, but not the people they live with. Obviously that's going to hit us working parents of primary age children hard because we can't in all conscience ask someone else to look after them or send them to school as the poster who can't feed her children on morals seems to imply.

As I've previously said, this useless government needs to get protections in place for working parents.

@ineedaholidaynow

Schools will have had inset days before opening so all staff together for meetings. However, they should have been SD

A family member works in a primary in London. All the teachers and staff crammed in one classroom together for the entire inset day. My family member had a mask on (she's living with someone vulnerable), but only one other person wore a mask. This school is looking to make staff cuts as finances are really not looking good, so there's no way they can afford too many supply teachers if shit went down.

Some schools will fare better than others in the face of the same crisis, that's for sure.

@TW2013

Say your dd has caught it from him on Thursday, she would probably not be symptomatic until Tuesday or Wed as average time to symptoms is about 5 days (I know that this varies but we have to bear in mind that if OP is not pragmatic about this she could be at home off and on for months). If she develops it she will have been contagious two days before so say Sunday and Monday. Even if you catch it tomorrow you are unlikely to be contagious until about Thursday by which time you will be looking after sick dd. I think I would be more cautious if she had sat next to him all day Thursday than if he was on the other side of the classroom.

You do not have to isolate under the guidelines, only if dd has symptoms/ tests positive. I would though try to socially distance both from dd and from other people at work etc. to minimise the risk.

Even if you catch it tomorrow you are unlikely to be contagious until about Thursday

Where did you get that idea from? You don't have to have symptoms to be contagious.

[quote StatisticalSense]@Frazzled2207
And also a basic common sense issue at that school.
What on earth were the school thinking in allowing all of the KS2 teachers to come into close contact so that one case has taken them all out of action. Honestly the head teacher of such a school deserves to be fired for gross misconduct as they have clearly acted negligently and completely against guidelines in such a way that has needlessly effected the education of hundreds of children.[/quote]
My thoughts exactly!
I'd like to see them explaining how all those teachers were allowed to be in close contact with each other. Complete & utter stupidity.

Thing is the parents (and teachers) are having to put up with whatever the HT decides. Literally life and death and they are not qualified.
Voting with my feet i would not be choosing the school with

bubbles over 30. With after school clubs mixing all classes.
other clubs using the premises.
letting all reception kids play with everything.
carpet time.
Singing
1 toilet for 30 kids

We are all going to sat at home watching another peak in cases while other countries continue education in person because they were stricter using SD and masks

Why would you cram all the teachers into one classroom for inset. So stupid.

Can someone just clarify what would happen in the following situation please?

Sibling 1 is self isolating because someone in their bubble tested positive.

Parent needs to take sibling 2 to school / collect from school but sibling 1 is too young to be left indoors on own.

Does that mean sibling 2 also misses out on 2 weeks education? Or would parent be able to take sibling 1 with them on drop off / collections?

Thanks

@Kitmerow
I have been wondering exactly this. In our situation we can probably manage because DH wfh and can supervise one child for a short time while I take kid not SI to school.
However many families will have this predicament. I think if it were me I would be asking a friend to pick up the non SI child and obviously make sure that they don't come in. It's relatively doable where everyone lives very close together but again not everyone will be in that situation. I think some families will end up having to take SI child on the school run. If going in a car I suppose if old enough they could sit in the car for 5 minutes, that won't bother anyone.

Even if you catch it tomorrow you are unlikely to be contagious until about Thursday

Where did you get that idea from? You don't have to have symptoms to be contagious.

Simple maths AmelieTaylor. As with most infectious diseases you are not contagious the minute that you encounter a virus. The evidence seems to suggest that the average time to symptom onset is 5-6 days and contagious about 48 hrs before symptom onset. OP's dd is probably only now contagious (if she has caught it) OP won't have caught it before now. Even if she catches it (if dd has caught it) she won't be contagious for at least another three days or so. Plenty of time to discuss with her work what level of risk they are happy to accept. Nothing to do with having symptoms or not.

I do think that perhaps because we're very early on in the term everyone will be taking an extra cautious attitude. As the term progresses and schools realise that their rules mean that no-one is ever in school long enough to actually get anything useful done they (and the government) will be forced to fine tune the rules a bit .

I live in GM where there are quite a lot of cases, everywhere. I'm really cross about the fact that there seems to be no acknowledgement of the fact that our kids are far more likely to be sent home than, as it stands, a child in southern england. Things might all change of course but as it stands it means my child has less chance of going to school on any given day. Money should be spent on testing every single child and every single staff member every week at least (ideally more frequently). The government spent untold millions on the nightingale hospitals - not saying they shouldn't have done but that was a complete white elephant. Money should now be spent on making sure enough testing is available to keep schools open.

A totally separate issue is the fact that in certain areas apparently you can't get tested locally currently. So they are potentially relying on people without a car to travel 100 miles round trips to get to a drive through test centre. Or maybe get a postal test but those take days. In the interim no school because you have a cough which probably isn't covid. Making sure there is adequate testing for all children (and others of course) that need it locally and in time all children full stop, should be an absolute priority.

Sibling 1 shouldn't be going anywhere if they are isolating. if a neighbour could pick up sibling 2 then SD with that child should be maintained as much as possible.

I saw two local primary schools having their staff meetings / inset day in the playground. Nicely socially distanced. One lot had some under umbrellas bless them because it rained that day and they don't all fit under the outdoor classroom covers (same lot are cleaning everything, we see them when we walk by). Temperature checks on the way into DS nursery and both schools we walk past, plus varied arrival and leaving times I've read on here that the temp checks are illegal, but everyone I know is happy about it. Neighbours have kids just in secondary school who have to segregate between classes even at playtime, so they're at least keeping the lower year groups as separated as possible.

Then I read (not just on here) about schools in other areas who are making no internal changes at all and worse, risking all their teachers getting infected by big staff meetings indoors. One school I heard of just says kids can't use toilets in break time to prevent mixing, every child must go during lessons instead, which sounds chaotic, but no other changes!

So overall, I suspect there will be a big variation in spread through schools.

@YouJustDoYou

It's fucking idiotic. One tests positive, the whole class of 30 then has to isolate for 2 weeks, parents losing out on work potentially etc. As it is im down three weeks pay because of this shit. Fucking sick of this fearful covid shit.

So what option do you propose? A child tests positive, and the other 29+ carry on just as normal, potentially passing the virus between not only increasing numbers of the class, but also their household members (including vulnerable older relatives etc)?

I agree that the Government should be covering furlough-style pay for those who have to self-isolate, and possibly for parents with self-isolating children, but I don't agree that measures for self-isolation of contacts of a positive case are excessive.