About a month or so ago we had some of the highest rates in the country. We are in West Yorkshire, bordering Lancashire.
My DP works in a secondary school. The virus ripped through and all year 9, 10 and 11 were off within weeks of each other. The entire senior staff team including the headteacher got it too. And some of the teachers.
They made the decision to test all staff because it was getting out of control and my DP tested negative.
However, I heard many stories of similar things going on in our area a month or two ago.
I’m frustrated and angry as there weren’t calls to shut schools back then.
We’ve also been under tight restrictions since July and in September our rates started creeping up, by October they were getting very bad indeed.
They’re dropping off now (probably one of the only areas that is).
I also know that hospitals in Manchester and Leeds were struggling, maybe not to the same extent as London, but Manchester definitely declared a major incident at one point.
A family friend contracted it back in October from working in a school as a lunchtime supervisor , she is in her early 60s and ended up in hospital on oxygen. She’s ok now. But I just wonder why we had to go through all of that with no mention of school closures.