When will isolating for children end??!

[november90]

I know nobody has an answer..... but has there been anything anywhere said about this?
Lots of suggestion for adults it'll be after all adults double jabbed (close contact isolation) but what about he kiddies who are so much more exposed to it with being in school and no jabs. My son is starting school in September and I'm just so worried about him having to isolate all the time and the impact that'll have on him :(

I think isolation, masks and SD will remain in place for some time yet as the virus keeps mutating.
It’s only ten days of isolation compared to lockdowns that lasted months and I’m more worried about health than ten days at home.

Be thankful you've yet to have a school child in this mess! My Y1 daughter has missed half her education as she enters her 3rd year at school. It's so sad, but at least she'll bounce back. I'm so sorry for those in critical year groups.

I think many more over 12s will be vaccinated by September - CV and CEV 16-18 have been done and now Pfizer is licensed for over 12s I think Cv and CEV over12s will be done next.
Schools policies on isolations will have to take vaccinated pupils into account, just like wider society probably will be doing by September.
Sorry that doesn't address your query about primary school specifically, but it can't carry on like this. Literally every activity is being cancelled in local schools and most schools have several year groups off already with a couple more weeks to go before holidays. It is farcial and won't be acceptable when the new school year starts in September.
They are going to have to do the daily testing of close contacts or else write off even more education and young people's chances in life.

I was having this exact conversation with colleagues at school today.

Essentially the decision is between isolating close contacts (and trying to control spread) albeit disruptively… or not - which would lead to much faster and bigger spread of cases. Possibly even more staff and students off - anyone who tests positive will still need to be off. Plus the spread into other demographic groups. Not to mention further variants. I am not sure the government will choose this option (but who knows!?)

All staff want things back to normal by September but I think the realisation over the last week is this probably won’t happen.

We have sent over 200 kids home in the last week to self isolate (having sent only 50 over the whole pandemic so far!)

No idea but it can’t wait until they’re all vaccinated. My DD is 3. There are no plans on the horizon to vaccinate children her age. If it came to testing her daily then I’d reluctantly do it if it was the only way to avoid these repeated disruptive and damaging isolations.

Surely it must be possible with all the data and bright minds in this country, to calculate the cost/benefit of all this isolation.
For example, 1000 students isolating for 10 days - on average how many lives will this save? 1? 5? 10? And where is the cut off where this is acceptable. I'm not sure if I would ever ask 100,000 days of Primary learning to be lost to save my life and I'm in my 30s, let alone what my 90 year old grandmother would think ? Why are we not doing this analysis?

I’m in Scotland and FM has already confirmed a review of the isolation policy for school contacts. Not sure what the outcome would be, but I can’t imagine daily testing would be much better for primary kids. But the choice would be a step forward I suppose

When all adults are vaccinated, we should get back to normal. It’s ridiculous. Of course it will rampage among kids - all viruses do, but when the only people at risk are protected then we need to operate society as normal.

People forget that in most cases when the kids are sent home, at least one parent has to care for them

@november90 I'm in a similar boat OP (though not living in England, I'm in Wales) and I think I've pretty much decided DD isn't going in September (she doesn't have to start formal education until next year though). I haven't told DP my thoughts yet though!

I think what's sealed the deal is the sport, as daft as that might sound. They've authorised Wimbledon, Silverstone and the Euro finals, but I can't meet DDs teachers before she starts there and I won't be allowed in the classroom (or even the playground) on her first day.

Coupled with the potential for her to be forced to undergo a 10 day isolation in a home with no garden if her class bubble bursts, I've decided to hold her back for a year and hope this shit show has resolved by 2022.

I think:

• When all adults are at least 2 weeks post their final vaccination
• When all CEV children have been vaccinated
• When we have more reliable fast tests OR when we have enough PCR capacity that all testing of contacts is PCR not LFTs
• When we have clear data about how effective vaccination is at preventing infection when a vaccinated person is in close contact for 6+ hours a day with 30+ infected people with no protection, because that is the scenario in a school classroom if isolation is removed.

Fuck knows. Friends have children on their third and fourth isolations. Perhaps they could do a football kit and magically be exempt from further isolations?

It's a mess isn't it.
My son is very sensitive and would never ever allow some one to test him. I took him for a pcr test last week and he was so distressed he hid in a cupboard and cried for an hour :(

It is unrealistic for it to continue for another school year. We are on 3rd/4th isolations in some cases in our school. That’s 40 days of missed education (well, slightly less cos weekends). That’s 40 days of a child’s year so far not able to leave the house & exercise when they are perfectly healthy. It’s appalling. Yet you watch the rest of society basically returning to normality!

In September, most teachers & staff will be double vaccinated. As will 70%-ish of the kids families. Close contact isolation has to be dropped. Maybe testing daily although even that’s not ideal.

@november90 - my DD was like this but she has got better so long as we test at home. For some reason, she’s OK if she lays on the floor and has her hands held firmly so she can’t bat the swab away. To us, it looks more distressing but she says she feels more safe when we do it like this 🤷🏼‍♀️

Have 1 13 year old dc off now

Lessons cancelled Willy nilly for his class.

Dd getting less on her mocks than she should yr ten Math teacher admitted to me all kids are down in predicted grades.

I'm reaching the limit with this now.

Out of 14 boys in ds footie team 7 are isolating from various schools. It's nuts!!!

Looking at the extremely rapid rise in cases in 5-9 and 10-14 year olds (see boys3's graphs on the data thread), the growth in case numbers in the primary / secondary age groups is indeed nuts - and we have to ask what the government is proposing to do about it, since it refuses - and has always refused - to make schools safer?

I think it really needs to end in September when adults should have had the chance to be double vaccinated. If it isn’t, they will have to carry on with the bubble system in school to minimise contacts. I really hope they can have a normal school experience again in September

I don't think schools can realistically be made safer I'm a secondary teacher so have 'skin in the game' '. We do twice weekly lfts which apparently aren't worth bothering with if a negative would release you from isolation, we wipe down desks etc, masks, bubbles, but schools and society in general are communal places. It's intrinsically part of living in society to interact. We need to just get on with life now and accept that Covid is a thing that happens, like flu, like noro etc.

Hopefully the most isolated - CEV and CV children (53,000 children shielded for about a year) will start to be vaccinated soon.

Obviously suppress and contain now, i.e. masks in schools, and the big one...border control (instead of things like 60,000 football fans etc) would be preferable to dragging this out into the winter, but there you go.

Hopefully we'll get more vaccine supplies by Autumn? Currently supply limitations leave us in a dilemma. Boosters for the vulnerable, or vaccinate over 12s. Both is needed really, to suppress and contain, prevent possibly more dangerous variants mutating. Perhaps Novovax will help?

I’ve got a Y11 who luckily hasn’t had to isolate. He actually had covid back in Jan when the schools were closed anyway. I’m also a TA and as yet our school have had no cases since the start of the pandemic but I’m very aware we are walking a thin tightrope which could go wrong at any minute. These poor children have suffered enough.

250000 children are currently off school.

Only 9000 of those have tested positive. A further 16000 may test positive.

A quarter of a million children missing school - 90% of whom are very likely to test negative.

And lets not forget it isn't just children testing positive. Because teachers are having to isolate (through test and trace) many children are missing school because there simply aren't enough teachers to keep schools open.
Maybe vaccinating the teachers months ago would have been a good idea.

Please please email your MPs about this, and specifically about the appalling double standards with regard to the football etc.

They need a better plan.

I don’t feel like they have ANY plan, let alone a better one.

Upper school has just 'burst'. We have sent home years 9,10 and 12.

Chaos

It's ridiculous. Once everyone over 18 is double jabbed they need to stop this maniacal asymptomatic testing in schools. If someone is sick they should stay home as normal. It's so disruptive and it's an absolute lottery. Nobody in our school has had to isolate all year. No cases at all. Others have been off frequently.

I’m dreading my youngest starting!! I will have 4 in primary school and we already have frequent isolations due to people testing positive, are are currently isolating now due to someone in ds class testing positive, have to keep them all home as I’m a lone parent. So with 4 in school gonna be even more isolations