@manicinsomniac
I am quite happy for them to use the month vaccinating teachers and then reopen schools again. Most of the over 70s and vulnerable groups will be vaccinated by then, so we should see an improvement on hospital admissions
ICUs are (apparently, I haven't been in one myself just hearing from friends and family) filled with men in their 50s and 60s.
As a very vague guesstimate, I would suggest that more than half of teachers are under 40, with a bias towards women.
As a woman in my 30s with no Covid vulnerabilities, I would be so upset and angry if things got changed around to offer me a vaccine before my morbidly obese 65 year old Mum can get one. We have got to support all the vulnerable before the rest of us. The chances of it being anything more than a nasty inconvenience for youngish, healthy people are so low.
I sort of agree but it is a nasty enough illness for people in their 20s and 30s that if enough staff get it, it will shut schools or limit student access to education. If school staff are not a priority for vaccines that is fine but it does mean that any attempt to reopen schools before cases are right down is likely to fail.
The new variant is more transmissible and seems more transmissible in children, which will cause real problems if schools fully reopened too soon. We have already had 3 staff cases in school this term with ~5% of the kids in. And I know of primary schools who have had to shut bubbles.
Personally, I would not want a return to schools only for things to end up like the end of last term very quickly, so I do think we need to be strategic and vaccines may be part of that strategy.
My personal opinion is that schools could do a partial reopening after half term with the right precautions in place, but if the DfE insist on all or nothing it will be Easter at least.