Why aren't they vaccinating teachers now?

[Dingdong99]

I just can't get my head around this

Surely if they vaccinate all the school staff, schools can reopen, kids can get on with their education

A lot of kids are really struggling now (and their parents). I just don't understand why they aren't prioritising schools reopening by vaccinating teachers

Am I missing something?

Oh sorry, I was responding genuinely to feelinghopefull's post, before scrolling back and seeing she is a usforthem-er, no debate therefore being possible.

I agree retail staff should be vaccinated as priority. Hundreds of people a day ( masked and unmasked) walk past each employee.

More vital for them than teachers I think!

The healthy over 50s are not high risk, anyone that is not comfortable can stay home!

You going to pay their wages then?

It's not just teachers though, is it? What about the family members the little walking vaccine vectors bring it home to?

"Most grandparents will be in their 50s, early 60s, most people my age have school age grandchildren if they have them, 80+ year olds generally have great grandchildren, I'm 62." Um, no. Lots of people don't have their kids in their 20s or early 30s so please don't assume the parents are all young and bomb proof. We're the same demographic as the staff - working age people from 20s to 60s. Plenty of parents of even KS1 children are in their late 40s/50s. ICUs are full of 50ish fat blokes, many of them with kids at primary school. Likewise, don't assume the grandparents of school age children are in their 50s and 60s. My son's grandparents didn't become grandparents until they were in their 70s. Until last March my DM did school pickups and childcare 3 days a week. My MIL continues to provide after school childcare for DH's nephews because his parents have no alternative.

Parental choice is not a thing, unless you deregister. Either schools are closed except to KWV, or they are open and non-attendance fines and prosecutions apply as normal.

I think the vaccination programme is based on personal risk of dying/needing icu once something is caught but not on liklihood of exposure.
Although healthcare staff is about continunity of service. I suppose in that way school services are disrupted by teacher absence so they could be vaccinated but they have to weigh that against community transmissions which is why schools were closed.
Places like super markets make huge profits and can employ extra staff to continue providing essential retail if they plan x amount are going to be isolating at any point.
Noone cares about individuals in policy making.

@feelingquitehopeful

The healthy over 50s are not high risk, anyone that is not comfortable can stay home!

There is no way entire generation of children can be lost. It is an outrage as it is. France are going into a full lockdown this week, but are keeping schools open. I suggest we do the same.

It appears you don't understand the relative situations in the two countries.

The UK situation is much worse.

@MrsMercedes

I agree retail staff should be vaccinated as priority. Hundreds of people a day ( masked and unmasked) walk past each employee.

More vital for them than teachers I think!

The difference here is ‘walk past’ rather than ‘remain in an unventilated room for an (at least) hour at a time with thirty other people without masks or social distancing’.

@feelingquitehopeful

Yet more bored teachers posting...

What a rude remark.

If you don't work in a school you have absolutely no idea. Teachers want schools open. But we want to feel safer in a room with 30 people each day. Why is that wrong?

School staff need vaccinations ASAP so we can be ready to reopen when hospitals ease up.

Teaching unions will likely oppose reopening until teachers have had their 2nd dose.

That's an absolute minimum of 4 weeks delay baked in from when you start vaccinating teachers....

Join the campaign if you disagree with masks, social distancing and are pretty suspicious about vaccines. If you think the elderly have had their time and people with asthma probably wouldn't have lived long anyway. If you think it's supportive to post teachers' work online and moan about it, if you simultaneous complain there isn't enough work and you aren't planning on doing it anyway. If you refuse to let your dc wear a mask in a shop as "no one muzzles my children!!" Etc etc etc.

@Athinginitself

Because hospitals are not full of teachers they are full of older people or those that are vulnerable, so they need vaccinating first.

This isn’t true, there are younger people in ICU, people in their 40’s and 50’s, some younger (30’s) and people with no underlying health conditions.

I don't understand this argument. Don't vaccinate teachers even though they are high risk of catching it as they may spread it without knowing? Why do school staff have to sacrifice their health for others? I'm tired of people acting like my life doesn't matter.
Yes vaccinating teachers won't stop community transmission but what's wrong with vaccinating people who are put at risk every day for their sake? People like supermarket staff, police and prison officers?

Literally no-one is saying ‘don’t vaccinate teachers’ or that your life doesn’t matter, that is all misinterpretation.
We’re just initially vaccinating people most likely to need NHS care if they catch it first, and NHS staff so the care is there (and it’s just more efficient to not have to take the admin time to differentiate by NHS job role), and once that is done, then yes there is a very strong argument to vaccinate the rest of us under 50/non-CEV by occupational/exposure risk, which would prioritise teachers, police, essential retail staff etc, and it’s very likely that will happen.

@devildeepbluesea

I agree with you OP. I'm sick to the back teeth of kids being thrown under the bus. DD is 7, cries every day and is heartbreakingly lonely. Older people need to continue shielding. Kids need to go back to school.

And what about people like me who work in care homes? We haven’t all been vaccinated yet and unlike teachers can’t work from home. Teachers will be vaccinated when all health and social care workers have been.

The healthy over 50s are not high risk, anyone that is not comfortable can stay home!

Everyone shouid be staying home!

Have you missed that is what we are all urged to do during lockdown?

I'm in my 50s with school age DC and all the sorts of things to do that other school parents have to do and juggle.

Do you really think it's magically possible for me to stay home even more than we are all already doing so (only leaving for essentials)? It's not a group you can somehow segregate

I not also at least one poster has talked about shielding the elderly. That would be a new step - the shielded are the CEV, and there were no age criteria for that.

If hospital beds were full of teachers, and children didn't live with families and bring the virus home, then this thread would make total sense.

Vaccinating our way back to schools opening is more complicated than it seems. Unfortunately we can’t safely open up as soon as all the over 70s / CEV have received their first jab. The average age of someone in ITU with covid is 58, lots of them CV but not CEV, Grandparent age of primary school children.
Once the over 50s and maybe teachers are vaccinated, but we don’t know yet how much protection a single jab gives or how long for, or how much it stops transmission. It’s going to take time to get all those groups 2 jabs (especially with 12 week spacing) so reopening might be based on reduced community transmission in the summer rather than vaccine rollout.

@LemonViolet

I don't understand this argument. Don't vaccinate teachers even though they are high risk of catching it as they may spread it without knowing? Why do school staff have to sacrifice their health for others? I'm tired of people acting like my life doesn't matter. Yes vaccinating teachers won't stop community transmission but what's wrong with vaccinating people who are put at risk every day for their sake? People like supermarket staff, police and prison officers?

Literally no-one is saying ‘don’t vaccinate teachers’ or that your life doesn’t matter, that is all misinterpretation.
We’re just initially vaccinating people most likely to need NHS care if they catch it first, and NHS staff so the care is there (and it’s just more efficient to not have to take the admin time to differentiate by NHS job role), and once that is done, then yes there is a very strong argument to vaccinate the rest of us under 50/non-CEV by occupational/exposure risk, which would prioritise teachers, police, essential retail staff etc, and it’s very likely that will happen.

It's not misinterpretation. I agree with everything you've said about the order and I understand the order as it makes sense.

However, don't be so naive to say no ones said it.

What are people meaning when they state schools should be open now!
Staff haven't been vaccinated. We would still be going back into classrooms of 30+ children each day with no social distancing or PPE. How am I supposed to interpret that if it's not your life is unimportant?

@DianaT1969

If hospital beds were full of teachers, and children didn't live with families and bring the virus home, then this thread would make total sense.

Yes quite!

These 'am I missing something' questions are basically a parallel universe where covid isn't a virus spread by human contact.

Can't work out if people are poorly educated or just full blown covid sceptics, but there is a lot of it about.

Vaccinating school staff will stop school staff getting so ill.

That's great and is important as the viral load can be higher due to conditions in classrooms.

But that's not going to stop the fact that 12-17yo are 7 times more likely to be the index case in a household and under 12's twice as likely.

It won't stop community transmission of the highly infectious covid variant we have right now. It won't prevent illness of those on the households it's taken to and won't have a big as impact on hospital admissions etc as people seem to think vaccinating school staff will have.

They should be done alongside other frontline keyworkers including (but not limited to) police and fire fighters etc. But we can't take the brakes off as we don't have the data about how it does or doesn't prevent transmission.

Note that the current numbers being hospitalised mostly caught covid AFTER schools closed for the holidays.

The numbers catching covid and entering hospital if we reopen schools will rise very fast.

Most of the deaths are older people. Many of the hospitalisations are younger.

@EmmanuelleMakro

I think you’ll find that grandmas theses days ste more likely to be called Helen or Lisa and be in their 50s and 60s but that would serve your scaremongering hyprbolr less effectively.

I think you'll find you've made a dick of yourself dear.

Despite your hang ups over the names of fictional people, all my friends with primary school kids are late 30s/early 40s, and our parents are at or around 70 so the next group to be called up.

While my social circle may not represent Britain as a whole, neither does yours.

I too think teachers should be raised as a classification for the vaccination.

Because they aren't the ones dying!!!!!!!!

I think schools need to reopen for everyones sake and to do that all school staff need vaccinating simply so there are enough staff to run the school effectively. Before over 50's certainly.

@India999

Because they aren't the ones dying!!!!!!!!

This.