The rate of infections in schools is being suppressed from public knowledge

[noblegiraffe]

...claims Karam Bales of the NEU.

I’m pretty sure I agree. When the newspapers are going mad about university cases and 13,000 kids and 700 teachers being off school in Birmingham doesn’t make national headlines, then something dodgy is going on.

This twitter thread collates all the evidence and is pretty damning twitter.com/karamballes/status/1315067136394625032?s=21

My own thoughts:
Why are the government ignoring the WHO recommendations on masks?
Why have they stopped PHE deciding who is sent home when there are cases in schools setting up their own helpline instead which sends home far fewer kids?
Why are the figures not being presented in a way that makes it clear which cases are in schools and not universities?
Why did Chris Whitty use a graph of test positivity rates instead of actual infection numbers in his briefing when it came to claiming that schools aren’t an issue?
Why are they insisting that children only get a test if they exhibit one of the three main adult symptoms, ignoring that the majority of children who test positive don’t have any of them?
Why are they insisting on vulnerable children being sent in with the threat of fines for non-attendance?
Why did they spend the summer pretending that unions were blocking the re-opening of schools and then paying social media influencers to say schools are safe, without taking any steps to ensure that they are?
Why did they announce a Plan B of rotas for schools in tiers of lockdown and then never actually use it?
Why did they say that an effective test and trace system was vital to opening schools and then also say they were surprised when demand increased when schools opened?
Why do they keep saying schools are a priority and that be the only thing they say about keeping them open?

And where the fuck is Gavin Williamson?

@Notselfish, it's not contradictory. Secondary school kids are not social distancing in classrooms and a huge majority don't wear face coverings (except in corridors, and that's not in all schools). They are not the post reliable at washing their hands correctly either compared to most adults at university. Primary school kids are not social distancing.

I suggest you read the Sage documents for late September. They know that closing schools (and everything) is really the only way to halt or suppress spread. Unfortunately they also know that this comes at a huge potential cost to society.

@Notselfish, it's not contradictory. Secondary school kids are not social distancing in classrooms and a huge majority don't wear face coverings (except in corridors, and that's not in all schools). They are not the post reliable at washing their hands correctly either compared to most adults at university. Primary school kids are not social distancing.

But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the poster who said that 27 children from classes are asymptomatically infecting people. I'm saying that if this was the case, it would not go unnoticed because all of their parents would be ill.

JVT has said that children aren't spreading the virus in the way that they might with other illnesses.

I don't think that the government are prioritising schools because parents have demanded it. Do you really think that the government care about what parents think anymore than any other group?

[quote Notselfish]**@Notselfish, it's not contradictory. Secondary school kids are not social distancing in classrooms and a huge majority don't wear face coverings (except in corridors, and that's not in all schools). They are not the post reliable at washing their hands correctly either compared to most adults at university. Primary school kids are not social distancing.

But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the poster who said that 27 children from classes are asymptomatically infecting people. I'm saying that if this was the case, it would not go unnoticed because all of their parents would be ill.

JVT has said that children aren't spreading the virus in the way that they might with other illnesses.

I don't think that the government are prioritising schools because parents have demanded it. Do you really think that the government care about what parents think anymore than any other group?[/quote]
If you read upthread you can see that parents are off with their children in pretty large numbers from one of the posts! Nothing is being reported.
I think that the government are using parents and 'education' as a way of getting children in school so they can get people back to work. They have another agenda!!
Its a virus ffs! No other virus i have heard of avoids children. Name one you know of!

This post was meant for @notselfish

Well I'm not a doctor or a scientist, I don't know much about viruses and I don't claim to.

But we do definitely know that the virus is certainly less harmful to children. My son caught it very mildly and none in the house caught it from him.

Notselfish
"Well I'm not a doctor or a scientist, I don't know much about viruses and I don't claim to.

But we do definitely know that the virus is certainly less harmful to children. My son caught it very mildly and none in the house caught it from him."

No, you are not a scientist. Scientists do not make general conclusions based on anecdotal evidence.

@NotQuiteHere this thread is full of anecdotal evidence, and the people on this thread are no more scientists than I am.

However the deputy chief medical officer said yesterday that children aren't spreading the virus. But according to everyone on this thread he's lying and 27 children from each class are spreading it.

However the deputy chief medical officer said yesterday that children aren't spreading the virus. But according to everyone on this thread he's lying and 27 children from each class are spreading it.

I don’t think everyone is saying he is lying more that he is making an assumption from something that has very little if any research into it.
If they had the scientific data to back this up then surely they would be sharing it.
The thing is those of us in schools and with children in schools are seeing cases multiplying and all we ask is that someone qualified to research it does. Surely that’s in the interest of everyone to understand what’s happening. (Although agree that the government probably don’t want the answer if that means parents can’t go to work).

[quote Notselfish]@NotQuiteHere this thread is full of anecdotal evidence, and the people on this thread are no more scientists than I am.

However the deputy chief medical officer said yesterday that children aren't spreading the virus. But according to everyone on this thread he's lying and 27 children from each class are spreading it.[/quote]
You will never be taken seriously on these threads if you don’t agree that children are super spreaders and are going to kill all the teachers regardless if the average Covid death is 81 years old then your always going to get shouted down...

(Although agree that the government probably don’t want the answer if that means parents can’t go to work

Well I keep reading time and time again on mums net that the 8% of the working population that are parents don't matter and the government aren't going to make policy to suit them. And now you're saying that the actual medical people advising the government don't understand and are making incorrect assumptions, but people on mumsnet know better.

@Harrysblondie I'm just inclined to agree.

I'm inclined to agree, didn't mean to type just.

OK

In 2019, there were around eight million families with dependent children in the UK, with 6.2 million couple families with dependent children (that is married or cohabiting families). Around 7 in 10 (73.2%) of these couple families had both parents in employment.

So I make that 1.8 million single parents or non couple families, about 9 million parents in families where both parents work or (4.5 million families with both parents working) and this leaves 1.7 million families where one or no parents work.

The workforce was just over 27 million employed people and 1.3 million unemployed in 2019.

i don't see how only 8% of the workforce comprises families with children, surely it will be higher than that?

Has anyone got a link for that stat please?

Imperial are doing a study but it will take 6 months or so.
All scientific evidence so far points to children being more likely to have the infection without symptoms (so cases in the younger age groups wouldn’t be picked up by our current TTT system - we only test those with symptoms).
The India study, finds children to be very efficient spreaders amongst themselves and their families.

imperialbrc.nihr.ac.uk/2020/09/15/children-covid-transmission/

Re kids spreading this

• it's a new pathogen - so we don't know much about it and we are still gathering data

• there is political mileage in saying kids don't spread it as then you don't have to factor in extra costs and complications in various ways (to put it very simply)

• it is entirely true to say that there isn't much evidence that children spread it because the data is still being put together

• however there certainly is SOME evidence of various sorts, such as a very large study from India published in Science, which is a very good journal, that supports the idea that children may be able to spread the disease.

• also it is very plausible that children might spread the disease, because they spread many other diseases (like flu) though it is really good that this is not affecting kids as much as flu does

and also

• there is evidence that lots of people in and around schools have covid. In fact the government's own graphs show lots of cases in schools and /or "education". Really a lot.

However

• where "education" is used as a category this can involve lumping together sixth formers and university freshers, effectively, in which case the explanation is that all the risk is because of the freshers

and

• the official line is that spread associated with schools does not appear to be exceeding that associated with their local communities. In which case the inference is that spread happened in that area, but is argued to have happened outside of schools.

To drill down further into all this we need lots of testing (but testing for various reasons isn't happening and there appears to be a desire to direct it away from schools).

We also need lots of research, but that a) takes time and b) requires an element of funding and authorisation, and Universities etc. need to be able to get in there and do this. I am not sure how much that is currently being supported or is possible.

So the CMO certainly isn't lying, but the texture of the knowledge that we have about schools is patchy and complex.

SAGE, 9 July: there must be "sufficient headroom in terms of overall infection rates" before schools reopen.

They knew and told us that the infection rates would go (significantly) up once schools reopened. Why would this be if children only catch it occasionally and hardly ever transmit?

Chris Whitty, 31 July:
"I think what we're seeing from the data from ONS, and other data, is that we have probably reached near the limit or the limits of what we can do in terms of opening up society"
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53612390

Yes, he knew that the limit was reached, but the schools reopened anyway, people were told to travel to work and Uni students were told to go to campuses.

CMO knows very well that what is going is wrong, but cannot do anything against stupid decisions of the government. So he is putting a good face on the matter and staying economical with the truth.

Unfortunately they also know that this comes at a huge potential cost to society.

Yes, that's true but there's no zero cost option is there? It's entirely possible that not mandating mitigation in schools (so SD, masks etc) will lead to overwhelmed hospitals and lots of children losing parents or having parents disabled. I don't think they've properly calculated the cost of the harms to the economy and to society.

Also, countries that have kept infections at a low and manageable level - i.e. not like here - have much better functioning economies.

No-one's going on holiday when bodies are piling up, or eating out.

they've [not] properly calculated the cost of the harms to the economy and to society.

These things are extremely hard to calculate and quantify in advance.

Also hard, expensive and demanding to mitigate for.

Much easier to muddle through in the easiest possible way, in the [very] short term.

After that- oops! Look what's happened! How could they possibly have predicted those deaths!

After all, they can blame the deaths on the pandemic, and Brexit will distract everyone.

We can't know for sure what would have been the alternative outcome of a 2 week circuit breaker, 3 weeks ago. Or of protecting the vulnerable more.

Some of the current crowd could resign or leave to spend some more time with their family in the next year or 2, probably without admitting responsibility for the effects of their decisions. Then it will be someone else's problem.

In my area the local news websites and papers report covid cases in schools. The school itself also keep us informed, we have had 2 cases so far.

To be fair the school have put in quite strict measures and so far they seem to be working well (hold my hands up wasn't best pleased at first, but I can admit when I was wrong).

The people who decide what measures are put in place in individual schools appears to be the school management rather than local or central government so not sure how you can blame government on this one (of course overall they are a complete shower and as for GW, he makes a wet weekend look good).

@AlphaJura

That was Gavin Williamson saying 'little transmission occurs in schools'. Ffs

The only way that could possibly be even slightly true, would be if there was actual evidence that kids don't spread it between themselves/others. Which there does not really appear to be.

That said, schools going back has not affected the numbers anywhere near what I expected. And the numbers for 5-9 year olds conitnue to baffle me, so I guess its possible younger kids really are unlikely to give it to anyone and maybe its spreading via teachers catching it, but, honestly it seems quite unlikely, and even if it was teachers spreading, thats still part of school, is it not?!

The it doesn't spread in schools thing, seems similar to the 'work does not affect spread' schol of thought. Its wishful thinking, I think. If restaurants and such spread it, of course workplaces do too, and for most, 'covid secure' is a complete and utter myth, lets be honest..

Interesting article, in Ireland they're thinking of closing pubs and schools.

Coronavirus: Covid spike warning if schools and pubs stay open www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-54517791

Is the virus different in Ireland?

Or family life?

I think with kids being asymptomatic often that they could pass it to parents without even realising. Which makes it easy for the government to say it had nothing to do with the school transmission. And also they can remove any “blame” from themselves for keeping schools open. As you can easily say “oh well we don’t know where parents got it from perhaps it was when they met with friend/ went to pub” etc.

@neurotrashwarrior the virus rate is very high there just now and they have a low number of icu beds

@Chickenandrice

I think with kids being asymptomatic often that they could pass it to parents without even realising. Which makes it easy for the government to say it had nothing to do with the school transmission. And also they can remove any “blame” from themselves for keeping schools open. As you can easily say “oh well we don’t know where parents got it from perhaps it was when they met with friend/ went to pub” etc.

Yes, it could well have been when they went to the pub though!