Delta variant spreading in schools

[noblegiraffe]

Not posted one of these threads in a while but the data is starting to get interesting again.

The ONS infection survey data from yesterday shows an alarming increase in infection rates in secondary kids. The PHE survey also shows a jump in outbreaks in schools.

However the infection rates by area show that this is much more of a problem in the North West than e.g. the South West. That suggests that in certain areas, the situation is really bad and in others there's not (yet) a problem. This would suggest a localised approach (the govt are really keen not to talk about tiers).

What is obvious is that there are local variant hotspots, and in those hotspots, covid is running through schools, secondary in particular.

What to do? Stopping the spread of the variant out from those areas should be a high priority. Surge vaccination of adults won't be enough if it is spreading mostly in children. It's evident that the measures taken to stop the spread in schools from Sept-Dec were inadequate (isolation of close contacts only) so it seems clear that in those areas, far more robust tackling of cases in schools is needed -PCR testing not LFT, sending home whole year groups, proactively closing schools instead of as last resort. Schools in those areas already seem to have kept masks. We need to be hearing far more of what they are doing about schools in the news and what to expect.

There are those who would argue that the Delta variant should simply be allowed to spread now, however we know that one vaccination doesn't confer much immunity to it and it would be more prudent to wait until a much bigger proportion of the population are double-vaccinated and more fully protected.

There is also the question of allowing covid to spread through schools and the disruption to education that this would cause. The government announced yesterday that they are only willing to fund a pitiful amount of catch-up support and given that the schools affected are currently restricted to certain areas (and ones that were badly affected last year too), parents and pupils in those areas should not be expected to experience severe disruption caused by unmitigated covid spread if it can be dealt with more effectively. It would seem fair for more covid catch-up funding to be directed to those areas hardest hit but I haven't seen that proposed.

A few positive things: We've just had half term and that usually reduces infection rates in school children. Y11 and Y13 have now left, so secondary schools will have a reduced number of pupils. It's also less than 2 months to the summer holidays.

The Pfizer vaccine has just been approved in the UK for ages 12+. Vaccinating secondary children in those hotspots as a priority could be an option. Priority vaccinations for school staff there should be a no-brainer, I assume that has happened.

Unfortunately the government is currently suppressing data on the number of cases of the Delta variant in schools and there is a legal challenge to get this published. Why they are doing this is unclear. I do hope it's not because they want to pretend that schools aren't an issue until it's too late like they did before, but I don't trust them, for obvious reasons.

@Feenie

Always astounded by those posters who insist on saying 'shhhh, let's not talk about it and it's bound to go away' and seem convinced that by talking about it, we are somehow making it happen. Really daft.

This

Sorry! Going to duplicate again!

This is interesting.

Average learning losses for primary school pupils stood at nearly 2 months in reading and over 3 months in maths in the first half of the autumn term, before recovering in the second half of the autumn term, and then regressing again in the spring term:

So the children can recover with just a couple of months of teacher face to face and hopefully, is what some staff are seeing of their pupils 9 weeks into this current phase. Very encouraging and well done to the children, parents and school staff.

The government now just need to put their money where their mouth is.

Once again (seems like the same thing as last year) if you want schools to stay open you have to put measures in place before the numbers get to high

Which invariably means to close the schools down as schools through out last year were unable to satisfy 'safe measures'.

These threads are like a klaxon to rally up support on school closures. to suggest otherwise is disingenuous.

The vaccine offers great protection towards the virus ( if it didn't what would be the point in even having it?) Infections might be rising but that's not the same as deaths. We are at a point now where we will just have to live with it. And I'll say it again - closures were originally put in place for the benefit of the NHS, they were not overwhelmed last time and they certainly won't be now we have had a fantastic roll out of the vaccine.

Argh, why can't some people understand there is a big grey area between shutting schools and leaving it to spread?

It is the idiots who refuse to accept any change at all who are ensuring our children are more likely to be ill.

Masks, ventilation, some distancing - all these help keep schools open.

The stupidity is getting to me now. 'The vaccine offers great protection' - kids haven't had the vaccine, it is spreading in schools.

@Scrambledcustard

Once again (seems like the same thing as last year) if you want schools to stay open you have to put measures in place before the numbers get to high

Which invariably means to close the schools down as schools through out last year were unable to satisfy 'safe measures'.

These threads are like a klaxon to rally up support on school closures. to suggest otherwise is disingenuous.

The vaccine offers great protection towards the virus ( if it didn't what would be the point in even having it?) Infections might be rising but that's not the same as deaths. We are at a point now where we will just have to live with it. And I'll say it again - closures were originally put in place for the benefit of the NHS, they were not overwhelmed last time and they certainly won't be now we have had a fantastic roll out of the vaccine.

Re practical measures that can be put in place, masks helped from March onwards, how about recommending they get used in the classroom again?

And how about prioritising vaccination for CEV/CV children.

Masks, ventilation, some distancing - all these help keep schools open

eh? We had that last time - still closed.

The stupidity is getting to me now. 'The vaccine offers great protection' - kids haven't had the vaccine, it is spreading in schools

Are children now dying of Covid? Is this going to be a 'vaccinate all children' before they are allowed back issue now? You are aware that for 99% ( even less)of people that catch it won't die?

@Scrambledcustard

If you don't understand why we shouldn't just let it spread through school, that's your problem.

I don't set the threshold for my children right down at 'will they die' either.

And I'll say it again - closures were originally put in place for the benefit of the NHS, they were not overwhelmed last time and they certainly won't be now we have had a fantastic roll out of the vaccine

How would you define the NHS being overwhelmed ?
In December and January there was no elective surgery, ITU was at 300% capacity.There are junior doctors going into general practice in September who know almost norhing but Covid. NHS wait lists are at an all time high.

Few people died on the street but many, many died who in other times could or would have been saved.

@ichundich

BBC News - Covid: Pupils fell behind again in second lockdown www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-57357663

Closing schools should be avoided at all costs.

Agree.

So do we all here.

So do you have any ideas what the government can do to prevent this happening as necessity during this current wave in schools?

I don't set the threshold for my children right down at 'will they die' either

The risk of a child dying from COVID-19 is extremely low, with a current estimate of mortality of 0.01%. This means one death for every 10,000 cases - taken from this site post.parliament.uk/latest-evidence-on-impacts-of-covid-19-in-children-march-2021/

@traumatisednoodle

And I'll say it again - closures were originally put in place for the benefit of the NHS, they were not overwhelmed last time and they certainly won't be now we have had a fantastic roll out of the vaccine

How would you define the NHS being overwhelmed ?
In December and January there was no elective surgery, ITU was at 300% capacity.There are junior doctors going into general practice in September who know almost norhing but Covid. NHS wait lists are at an all time high.

Few people died on the street but many, many died who in other times could or would have been saved.

People dying on the street? where? Have you got a link?

Yes, @Scrambledcustard, that is why I said I don't set the threshold for my children right down at 'will they die' either

The key word is 'don't'

@colouringcrayons

Yes, *@Scrambledcustard, that is why I said I don't set the threshold for my children right down at 'will they die' either*

The key word is 'don't'

So if children have very little risk from dying of it, vulnerable teachers have been vaccinated, the over 40s have been vaccinated why is it an issue?

Whats wrong with letting people getting mildly ill from it if they catch it?

I said people didn't die on the street, people died at home waiting for the paramedics, in ambulances trying to get into rammed hospitals.

Our bestman's Ddad (aged late 70's) had it in Feb 20. He got an intensive care bed and surrived in March/April 20 or Dec20/Jan 21 he wouldn't have. The NHS being overwhelmed isn't a binary thing. The standard of care is now worse than it was in Febuary 2020 for everyone. The NHS has been partially overwhelmed.

@Scrambledcustard

I don't want my kids to be off school for isolation (repeatedly), I don't want them to have a nasty bout, I don't want them to have lingering symptoms as c.10% do, I don't want any of the nastier (non-death) complications, I don't want new variants to spread, I don't want it to spread more widely in the community.

If you think the only question is 'will X person die' you're wrong.

The NHS is currently overwhelmed with waiting lists for other conditions already. Children’s education has already suffered immensely so vaccination drive appears the only “way out” but the point is vaccination alone is not enough. We might just have to accept that living with restrictions, testing, masks is here to stay for the foreseeable future. But many just don’t want to accept that. They just want to deny there is a problem and invoke their rights to live like they did pre-pandemic.
It just can’t happen yet because we need to put lots of different breaks on the virus spread. If all children in the country get the virus at the same time some of them will suffer and need treatment and they will pass it on to eg blood cancer sufferers (who even if fully vaccinated) are likely to die.

"Whats wrong with letting people getting mildly ill from it if they catch it?"

It's wrong because if children keep catching and spread in school means they will have their education interrupted. There's sinple measures they can take in school like mask wearing etc to reduce that.
It's weird we all seem to want the same thing, that school to be open, yet some people want it without putting in any safety measures for both teachers and pupils to ensure the school to be kept open.

And the more virus out there the more chance of mutations.

I still cannot believe this far in people don't understand that simple point.

We are allowing mutations by allowing it to rip through communities we are deciding are safe from the virus. Yet at some point that could mean we get a variant that is designed to make that subset of community iller. Why would we just wait for this to happen?

There are ways to get through the next year with greater safety - and yes - it's hard work and draining. But the more we do now the quicker we can get through it and the less time we have to do it for.

@roguetomato

"Whats wrong with letting people getting mildly ill from it if they catch it?"

It's wrong because if children keep catching and spread in school means they will have their education interrupted. There's sinple measures they can take in school like mask wearing etc to reduce that.
It's weird we all seem to want the same thing, that school to be open, yet some people want it without putting in any safety measures for both teachers and pupils to ensure the school to be kept open.

But children get sick all the time and have time off school. An individual get sick and has individual time off. The vast majority of children asymptomatic.

There has to be a point when we live with this rather than batten down the hatches when a new variant comes - which they mutate all the time.

The vulnerable have been vaccinated
The over 40s have been vaccinated
The 20s/30 have very very little chance of dying from it
Children have 0.1% chance of dying from it

This week was still below the national five year average of deaths according to the ONS by 3.2%

So really what is the issue? We have massively minimised the the dreadful effects of this virus so we just have to live with it now rather than the handwringing and klaxon calls.

@itsgettingwierd

And the more virus out there the more chance of mutations.

I still cannot believe this far in people don't understand that simple point.

We are allowing mutations by allowing it to rip through communities we are deciding are safe from the virus. Yet at some point that could mean we get a variant that is designed to make that subset of community iller. Why would we just wait for this to happen?

There are ways to get through the next year with greater safety - and yes - it's hard work and draining. But the more we do now the quicker we can get through it and the less time we have to do it for.

So what was the point in the vaccine? Studies ARE showing that is is still offering effective protection.

'Ripping through communities'? Infection rates don't equal death rates. Covid is not an automatic death sentence far from it. In fact you have a 99% chance of surviving it. The mortality rate is 0.66% which increases with age. All those people have now been vaccinated.

You say children have 0.1% chance of dying from it. 1 in 1000 if they catch it? Isn't that bad enough, let alone those with complications afterwards?

I would say if they were klaxons for anything these threads have been klaxons to take precautions so that schools don’t have to close. If the 2 week circuit breaker had been taken in October maybe schools wouldn’t have had so many groups out isolating on rotation, if masks had been implemented in schools earlier maybe the January closures wouldn’t have been necessary or at least they could have been in on Rita’s with blended learning. If anything has caused unnecessary closures it has been influential lobbying groups preventing safety measures being implemented when needed in schools.

I’ll say again that I don’t want school closures. We need to be in school especially now as we come into the time of year where we need to not only teach our remaining students but also get ready for next year doing all of the rewriting schemes of work, creating resources etc ready for next year and working out timetables etc.

I don’t want more disruption, kids are settled back in schools, seating plans are where I want them, we’re making really solid progress on learning and revising areas that need it. It’s also nice to have improved weather and the fields open at lunch so they have more space and fun etc.

Why would we want schools closed? The fastest way to close schools if that was the agenda would be to go along with no mitigation and ignoring warnings about spread.

So really what is the issue? Can't believe people are still asking this question after more than a year. Humans are supposed to learn.

Also this old bollocks we just have to live with it now just means 'pretend it isn't happening' - actually living with it would mean sensible mitigation to prevent it getting away from us again.

Why would we want schools closed? The fastest way to close schools if that was the agenda would be to go along with no mitigation and ignoring warnings about spread.

This. Mindboggling that it is 18 months in and we are still having the same conversations.