Would the schools problem be solved by masks

[notevenat20]

If all secondary school children wore masks all day and we only then sent home people who sat next to them at lunch if they got covid, would that solve most of the covid schools problem?

It's exactly what they do in France.

@Hollyhead - clean hands don’t stop bacteria growing in dirty masks. As for shielding teachers doing the home learning: how incredibly neat, the world you live in, that there are the right number of teachers to do this for every subject within each Local Authority, and how amazing they would be to provide a good education to lots of random children they know nothing about from a huge number of different schools which all left off teaching at a different point in the syllabus of different exam boards. Not at all a safeguarding and education mess!

There is no reason why in the uk they couldn’t just send home children sitting next to the person with covid rather than whole class. Although in secondary this is likely to be 20 or so students

They often send the entire year home. That was 300 pupils in my local comp.

This is hardly a ringing endorsement.

The ringing endorsement part was the combination with the fact that children get an uninterrupted full time education and women’s careers and lives are not ruined by their children being sent home constantly.

@SunshineCake certainly some will, but I think they will be in the minority. I teach y6 so just below secondary age, but I can say with total confidence that masks would not have been a good idea in any class I've taught.

@indemMUND totally agree, adults do it too. I constantly catch myself adjusting my mask without meaning to, and I only have to wear them for an hour at a time max, not all day.

Well there is a reason they send the whole class home in primaries certainly - the children play with each other at lunch, line up together etc. It's explicit in the guidance that young children aren't expected to SD from each other. Sending home just the person they sit next to wouldn't stop the spread

totally agree, adults do it too. I constantly catch myself adjusting my mask without meaning to, and I only have to wear them for an hour at a time max, not all day.

I think you get better at it with practice. I also am terrible with a mask but my friends who wear them all day at work never touch them once to adjust them.

@notevenat20 - we don’t need to wait to know that wearing a mask all day has increased the incidence of unpleasant and potentially dangerous facial skin conditions and has not noticeably reduced virus transmission rates in France, as they are still climbing remorselessly. Creating a false sense of security can be dangerous.

That's not what's happening in my LA. Teens are definitely a problem but they're not catching it at school, they're the one group that is complying with SD in school.

What LA has enough classroom space to have teens SD?

We have 32 per class. No SD because we don't have room.

However, we haven't had a single case of transmission between students in school.

You haven't had any symptomatic cases of student transmission. Its likely the students are spreading it.

Well there is a reason they send the whole class home in primaries certainly - the children play with each other at lunch, line up together etc. It's explicit in the guidance that young children aren't expected to SD from each other. Sending home just the person they sit next to wouldn't stop the spread

I don’t really understand why we take this view in Britain but they don’t in other countries. In France for example their view is that primary school children (who don’t wear masks) are a low contact risk. Surely the science is universally the same.

Here in Germany the kids do have to wear masks at school, at least everywhere except at the desk. However, my daughters school has had a class quarantined because of 8 kids and 3 teachers testing positive and now they have to wear masks all the time. My son is in a different school and is currently in a 2 week quarantine because a child has tested positive. We are waiting for my son's test result. I suspect he will also have to start wearing a mask all the time soon as well.

we don’t need to wait to know that wearing a mask all day has increased the incidence of unpleasant and potentially dangerous facial skin conditions and has not noticeably reduced virus transmission rates in France, as they are still climbing remorselessly.

Have you conflated a few things here? It is true that France, like Britain, is in a second wave. But I don’t it is true that French schools are causing this more than in the uk.

Surely the science is universally the same.

There's no logic to it. Otherwise I'd be able to have 7 people in my house from one family, and not 6 from two.

Typo: don’t think

@notevenat20 I appreciate that. What I am saying is that if we wanted to copy anything from France it could be the number of children sent home not the mask wearing idea. Although not all schools in England are sending whole year group home.

There's no logic to it. Otherwise I'd be able to have 7 people in my house from one family, and not 6 from two.

That is a quite distinct issue. The reason we have a simplistic rule is that when we had more nuanced rules the govt discovered no one understood them so didn’t follow them at all.

@notevenat20 - ah, so you are not conflating anything and have evidence of less transmission in French schools than English schools, do you? Looking forward to seeing your evidence!

I appreciate that. What I am saying is that if we wanted to copy anything from France it could be the number of children sent home not the mask wearing idea. Although not all schools in England are sending whole year group home.

But the reason they don’t send the whole year home (or even class) is precisely because of their mask policy. At least in secondaries, for primaries one of the UK and France is just wrong as far as I can tell.

ah, so you are not conflating anything and have evidence of less transmission in French schools than English schools, do you? Looking forward to seeing your evidence!

I think there is a misunderstanding. I didn’t say there was less transmission in France. I said there seems to be no more transmission despite their having the huge advantage of not sending whole years home.

@notevenat20 - so, you have no useful evidence of anything, then.

Masks don't really work very well. One of my friends got it from a colleague whilst wearing medical grade masks, plus NHS test and trace don't count masks as a reason for close contacts not to isolate, only full NHS ppe (n95 masks, aprons, gloves and visors) excludes close contacts from having to isolate.

As if teenagers would were them correctly. I am a health care professional . I change my mask 5/7 times a day. Taking it of carefully. Straight into a bin.
I also have breaks and time off from them through the day. I really don’t think teenagers are going to to that. Even if they have a big stock of reusable masks every day lovingly washed by their parents.

[quote Walkaround]@SunshineCake - my experience is that your children are in the minority. It might be taken more seriously if it became compulsory for all, all the time, than, eg, compulsory only in corridors, but quite frankly, with all-day mask wearing, you are guaranteed that more children/teenagers than not will be wearing dirty masks that should have been changed ages ago, storing used masks inappropriately and thus contaminating and being contaminated by everything they touch, and touching their masks and faces regularly throughout the day.[/quote]
Such negativity. The schools my kids are at have been great. All the children comply, no fuss, they get the consequences.

You can't guarantee anything. I just know what my children are doing but from what they have said the other students are doing the same.

I see more adults wearing masks in a pointless way than younger people.

@notevenat20

This is hardly a ringing endorsement.

The ringing endorsement part was the combination with the fact that children get an uninterrupted full time education and women’s careers and lives are not ruined by their children being sent home constantly.

I get the impression you are keen for schools to stay open full time with no distancing irrespective of transmission.

My view is we need distancing and I would prefer to prioritise that. I think that benefits me, my children, the economy and the whole country over the medium to long term. What we are doing currently is stupid imo, but I accept the louder view in the UK is to carry on regardless.

The full time schools view won, and we are where we are. But I think it was wrong, it is wrong, and it will be even more wrong as we get further into winter.

We need social distancing in secondary schools, and we need a more precautionary approach to virus control in schools.

The latest thing I’ve read is that ventilation is the most important thing. How can pupils be exposed to the fresh air coming in if they have a mask over their face? What chemicals would they be breathing in all day from disposable masks or washing powder in material ones?

No children have been sent home from my child’s school yet.

I think there is a misunderstanding. I didn’t say there was less transmission in France. I said there seems to be no more transmission despite their having the huge advantage of not sending whole years home.

There's no evidence from either country that their similarly ridiculous school arrangements aren't the driver of their rapidly escalating problems.