“Schools are Safe” says Borris...

[Aponcetasticchristmastoall]

He’s popped his head up with the above...

No explanations, no counter arguments on SAGE’s finding or NEU’s report...

Just send your children to school I’m quite sure they are safe...

He is a bloody joke!!!

Thanks for the support everyone. What a crazy position we've been put in as parents. Never ever thought I'd see the day where it wouldn't feel safe to send the DC's to school. I just hope the school take it easy on me even though they'll know I'm lying.

@catgirl1976

Eton is still closed though

No it isn’t, or at least not in the sense you mean. Year 11 and 13 are scheduled to go back on the 11/12 for the original start of term - independents often start later than state schools - and the other years are hoping to go back on the 18th as fir everyone else, unless the rules change.

What a random comment

Tanith

Nursery in a school. I’m not lying. I work in a school. I’m not even going to look ob here anymore. You have all made your minds up. God forbid if anyone has a different opinion. What ever happened to kindess.

@Panickingpavlova

I know a supermarket worker who died of covid aged 44 with teenage children . Unfortunately this applies to a lot of jobs.

I think the closure of schools is going to be forced now anyway .

Which will also means an awful lot of people won’t be going to work tomorrow.

Queen of thorns

My husband asks “ What cycle threshold are they using to differentiate between infected and non infected?”

@QueenOfThorns

My husband has asked this “What cycle threshold is used to differentiate between infected and non infected cycles?”

@QueenOfThorns

By the way it’s WHO that are requesting CT cycle information to be presented with all test results, not just my husband randomly commenting.

[quote Kjc39]@QueenOfThorns

My husband has asked this “What cycle threshold is used to differentiate between infected and non infected cycles?”[/quote]
@Kjc39 I’m sure that you and your husband both understand that this detail is specific to the testing platform used. A quick Google pulls up the information leaflet for one widely used test: assets.thermofisher.com/TFS-Assets/LSG/manuals/MAN0019215_TaqPathCOVID-19_CE-IVD_RT-PCR%20Kit_IFU.pdf

Looking through this, I can see that the PCR protocol specifies using 40 cycles. Technical information such as limits of detection and Ct values can be found at the end of the document. This test has been approved by the regulators for clinical use, so I would imagine that its performance has been scrutinised very closely and your husband needn’t worry about false positives arising from samples containing no template.

But the issue is not whether schools are safe. It’s whether we need to close schools to slow the spread of infection. The risk of serious illness from covid is exactly the same now as it ever was. Children always stood a risk of bringing covid home from school - the “rules” don’t eliminate the risk.

@QueenOfThorns

Thanks for your reply. The taqpath protocol doesn’t comment on what ct values are indicative current infection and/or likely hood if being infectious to others. Do you know what those ct values are and where I can find this info?

[quote Kjc39]@QueenOfThorns

Thanks for your reply. The taqpath protocol doesn’t comment on what ct values are indicative current infection and/or likely hood if being infectious to others. Do you know what those ct values are and where I can find this info?[/quote]
If I wanted to know the answer to that question, I would try searching PubMed rather than asking randoms on MN. Except you don’t, you’re just being disingenuous aren’t you?

Is your husband not a scientist @Kjc39? Perhaps he can explain it to you?

@QueenOfThorns

I am a scientist. This is the husband. I thought you said your husband was involved in PCR Covid testing. I’m genuinely after the information I asked for. The info you tagged does not provide this.

Kjc this sounds like you using your DH to try and catch someone who disagrees with you out. It's not really a good look.

[quote Kjc39]@QueenOfThorns

I am a scientist. This is the husband. I thought you said your husband was involved in PCR Covid testing. I’m genuinely after the information I asked for. The info you tagged does not provide this.[/quote]
@Kjc39 OK, I will give you a proper answer then! I’m not an expert in infectious diseases, but I would not expect there to be a single answer to this question. It would surely depend on the route of transmission involved, duration and type of contact with the infected person. You can imagine that the amount of virus needed to infect someone you pass on the pavement would be a lot more than to infect someone you sit in a car with for half an hour. It’s therefore impossible to give an answer about whether someone is infectious based on how many PCR cycles it took for a signal to appear.

I don’t want to ‘out’ DH on MN, so I didn’t ask him for clarification yesterday, but he really does know his stuff as far as this is concerned. He confirmed my thoughts above, and said that the best they can do is calculate how many virus particles were present in the original sample. He also pointed out that this is highly dependent on how well the sample is taken - sampling technique can lead to a 10-fold difference in the amount of virus present in the sample.

I hope this helps - your question is relevant, but doesn’t work in real life. As far as I can see, we have to err on the side of caution and assume that anyone with a positive PCR result has the potential to infect others, even though it won’t be true in some cases.

www.tes.com/news/exclusive-teacher-covid-rates-333-above-average