Sunday Times just reported that all schools in England will be back on 8 March

[LimitIsUp]

This quote from the article:
"All schoolchildren will return to the classroom on March 8 under plans to start lifting the lockdown, Boris Johnson will announce in a national address next week.

Under the government’s blueprint to reopen society, adults will initially have only small new freedoms so as to prioritise the return of schools — a move ministers know will raise the coronavirus R number for infections.

Adults will be allowed to sit down outdoors for a coffee or on a park bench with one friend, or with members of their own family — a slight relaxation of the current rule, which permits outdoor meetings only while standing up.

The decision to reopen both primary and secondary schools goes against the advice of some government scientists. But the prime minister was swayed by faster than expected reductions in hospital admissions and infections."

I can link to the article but for those of you without a subscription, there is a pay wall

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/back-to-school-on-march-8-as-johnson-starts-lifting-lockdown-0v5zbz5bt

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• Title edited by MNHQ (it said October, we've changed it to March as reported) *

What are the outcomes of NHS cases? The one I linked below hit the press.

I cannot see that any court would set precedent in a pandemic

I wasn’t aware of “badgering” as a synonym for queuing up. Quite the opposite, I’d have thought.

Thanks for the insight into what lawyers like too.

It’s like people don’t understand how statistics work. For example, you’re low risk. You have a 1% chance of dying from COVID. Unfortunately someone in that low risk group has to be that one person out of 100 (or whatever the percentage is, it’s much lower but for arguments sake..)

Doesn’t change the absolute risk if you know people that were in the percentage that died. But yes that will alter your personal perception of risk.

@mumsneedwine 3 colleagues dying is absolutely awful but it’s not proportionate.

No outcomes yet marsha. It'll be years no doubt as groups of cases will be formed.

These are the victims' groups that Boris won't meet.

@Pastanred

Group 6 is not a huge group - 2.2 million so it'll take less than a week at current vaccination levels

see link above

group 6 is 7.2m.

Please explain

@KasparKat

Yes there's a big risk of new variants once children start mixing en masse again. I think that for all we have gone through in the past year, if we can make it another 2/3 weeks of proper lockdown we can get a proper handle on this. Opening up too soon risks a much longer lockdown/restrictions in the long term.

I feel that we are now at the beginning of the end and to open up a few weeks too soon now, risks everything that we have all sacrificed to achieve.

Exactly!!

My please explain was to the not proportionate comment as I do not understand what they mean.

Piggy ah I see yes that is a long time

Just thinking about PPE it was a bum fight in early days, did we get more but it was diverted by other countries? I suppose it will come down to reasonable effort (not sure of legal terms) rather than negligence. It was incredibly hard to get.

@Pastanred

with regard CV teachers - we are over 3 weeks before schools go back . Group 6 will be done by then based on an average of 400,000 vaccines per day. So no excuses. Perception of risk differs from teachers actual risk. Those at risk will have been done by 8th march. Think there's only 5.5 million people in groups 5&6 which equates to about 13 days of vaccines. Its possible many of group 7 be done by then.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/02/14/vaccine-priority-list-oxford-pfizer-who-first-covid-when-mine/

I seriously hope we don't keep schools closed to protect a 25 year old teacher

I say that as a teacher myself - early 40s and happy to return to school currently

There's a 3 week period after the vaccination fir it to be effective

Group 6 is 7.2 million.

Given you say you're a teacher, your posts worry me.

I mean look at how long the Hillsborough enquiry took! Negligence is a long haul thing...

Bum fight = Bun fight

If you didn’t do your job and source PPE but if it was almost impossible to get due to other countries doing the same. I guess we’ll find out in a few years

Re ppe. Didn't they let it all go out of date and not update pandemic planning. I am fairly certain there is some scandal to be revealed there when the time is right.

@WouldBeGood - you’re a lawyer, aren’t you?

@DownWhichOfLate yep 😃

Fantastic

The BBC are yet again peddling misinformation on schools and quoting the flawed Warwick University study mentioned previously by Wouldbegood.

twitter.com/dgurdasani1/status/1361241748786315265

Which branch of law , out of interest?

What was the November lockdown in the Warwick report? I must have missed that.

They clearly didn't come anywhere my region before Christmas-staff and students coviding all over the place.

The Warwick report really should be seen properly before the press (and MN) start cherrypicking from it. It hasn't even as yet been peer reviewed and already feels out of date. That is the trouble with the data, always behind the developments.

I think moth it mentions a sire in certain areas due to Kent variant : but we all knew that?

It’s in The Telegraph too. Whether you agree with it or not the media have clearly been told to change the narrative towards schools today...

It would be nice for the press to present a balanced argument for a change.

Now that the vulnerable in society are protected and hospitals are no longer overwhelmed, we won't need to prevent transmission of the virus. We won't need bubbles. This virus is here to stay. We will need to learn to live with it.

@Rosesaresweet so what happens to clinically vulnerable children? They certainly aren't protected. And their siblings?

sire = Rise!