DS's friend has tested positive...

[whattodo2019]

school phoned today to DS's friend has tested positive. this child has been off school since monday. there fore my son has not seen him since then.
my DS has been told to self isolate until 28th Oct.

tonight i managed to get my son tested,
despite not having any symptoms. I know he should show symptoms but is it so wrong to test him?

He can be incubating for 14 days

@ekidmxcl

It isn’t a waste of a test. The government has drummed that shit into us because their testing system is so shit. The OP was right to test her son, if you think about it logically, rather than under the UK’s embarrassing 3rd world rules/strategy. That said, it’s also possible that he could still be incubating it and therefore the test wouldn’t pick it up.

thank you. I feel so relieved that he has been tested. he has t had any contact with the positive child for 6 days. in other countries where there is more testing, people who have been in contact are tested instantly. young teenagers mental health will suffer being isolated for 14 days ... more testing is needed. BTW i paid for my DS test privately

@ekidmxcl

Where can you pay for a private test OP?

i googled private testing in my local area and got one an hour and a half later! And on a sunday!! i'm not in London either

Dd tested negative. Four days later had raging symptoms.

He could still be incubating it if he saw the friend in the 2 days before symptoms started. The negative test doesn't mean he can stop isolating for the full 14 days

@vanillandhoney

How do you know it was this friend?

Someone else could have tested positive over the weekend!

only one child in his year was sent home on monday, he has since tested positive. my DS is at a small private school where we are all friends. The child's mum has also confirmed. it's going to happen in schools . i'm grateful for the school dealing with it so well. we have had 7 cases.

@ekidmxcl

Where can you pay for a private test OP?

i googled my local area and got a private test an hour and a half later. Amazing service. i have since found out a few friends have used them.

@Racoonworld

Regardless of the test result he stil needs to isolate for the full 14 days as he may develop it later in the incubation period. This is why you shouldn’t test when symptomless.

he will isolate but once we have the results we will feel more informed

Testing is ideal because if he is an asymptomatic carrier then his contacts can be traced and told to isolate. Given that it is 6 days since contact it is not a terrible time to test. Unfortunately we are not operating under ideal conditions so there is limited testing and obviously testing does not negate isolating regardless of result.

Why has he to isolate until the 28th and not the 26th if he last had contact on the 12th?

You need to find out when the contact started getting symptoms

Because if ur DS wasnt a contact for the 48 hours preceding then he’s not a contact so doesn’t have to isolate

It maybe tho that the child waited ages for test and result

If he was sent home Monday then he was symptomatic Monday? How awful

If he’d just stayed at home that day the 48 hour window would have been clear and no other kids from school affected

A y11 near me was symptomatic Monday but stayed off but given itd been weekend no one in school affected

we live in an area of very few cases

my DS is at a small private school where we are all friends.

i'm grateful for the school dealing with it so well. we have had 7 cases.

THAT does not sound like an area with very few cases.

Getting a private test does not solve the problem.

Amazing service. i have since found out a few friends have used them.

Erm, are your friends using tests when they've been in contact with a positive test in an effort to avoid isolating even though this might mean they are unwittingly still incubating it and then are potentially spreading it.

7 positives at a small school in an area of low infections... Something is not right with this picture.

7 positive is a lot

I’m tier 3- we have 800 kids in our school and have had 3 positive cases

Not wrong to get him privately tested just for your own information. But he still has to isolate for the 14 days even if the result is negative, so it’s a bit of a waste IMO.

I think their is an advantage to a private test in these cirumstances as if he tests positive you will know what you are dealing with. But, no matter what the result he will still have to isolate.

I don't agree that a teenager without pre existing mental health problems (don't know if this applies to your DS) will develop them from isolating for 14 days. It may be stressful and/or miserable, but that is a normal human reaction and not a mental health problem.

In any case testing will not solve the issue of isolating since a negative doesn't tell you anything except for a snapshot of that moment, and not a hugely accurate one at that. Your DS could still become unwell or infectious even without symptoms at a later point, so the isolation rule still applies unfortunately.

There not their!

We are Tier 2. Secondary school of 1800 pupils - only one positive so far.
7 in one small school is a LOT.

We are in a low rate area and none of the local schools have had a positive test (yet!). 7 positives in a small school is a lot

in other countries where there is more testing, people who have been in contact are tested instantly.
young teenagers mental health will suffer being isolated for 14 days ...
more testing is needed.

People who have been in contact may be tested instantly in other countries but presumably they are not allowed to de-isolate if the test is negative? Since it can take at least 7-10 days for antibodies to show in your system, therefore any negative result very soon after contact could easily be a false negative.

whattodo2019 you were absolutely right to get a test. I did the same (I paid for one, next time I won't). Tests should be 'on demand' if we are going to keep the R rate down. Kids should be screened regularly esp as there are no masks or social distancing at school. It's a disaster.

^young teenagers mental health will suffer being isolated for 14 days ...
more testing is needed.^

No, a teenager isolating for 14 days will be just fine. Its just his precious parents who are being ridicilous about it.

It sounds like the problem in your area isn't the testing, its parents misusing testing to avoid the necessary isolating that is...

Still can't get over 7 positive tests in a small school and you think the school is handling the situation well. No, that doesn't add up.

There's a high school in St Helens which is now T3 in an area which has a particularly high local rate.

Following intervention from St Helens Borough Council and Public Health England (PHE), 1,100 staff and students were tested on-site in an attempt to better understand the spread of the virus.

This testing uncovered 30 new cases, with a “significant minority” of students presenting as asymptomatic, in addition to 10 people who had already tested positive.

I don't know how big your sons school is, but something just isn't right here. You either have an outbreak strongly related to the school in someway or an awful lot of faulty tests going on. And if everyone is bypassing NHS tests and using private ones, is this being properly reported to PHE?

Yep, you've wasted the time and money ,it cost to process your child's test. Everyone knows symptoms can take up to 14 days to develop. Your test was pointless and achieved nothing.

If someone with symptoms can't get a test promptly, it's probably better to have a private one in the meantime because the accuracy of the test really diminishes with time I think. Good point though about whether the private test results get recorded with PHE. You'd hope so!