Last day of dreaded school calling…

[mightyducks]

Today should be the last day you can can get that dreaded call from school ….the sinking feeling of another child isolating, the stress and anguish it causes, I wish you all a phone call free day! It feels like a big moment for me

And my DD’s preschool have literally just said today that there are multiple parents who have tested positive and a child waiting on test results… so so close

Maybe part of the plan is to infect as many children as possible next week by not isolating close contacts in school then hopefully in September there will be fewer ill children in school - of the teenagers in school that have had covid I'd say they average about 3 weeks off sick so better to get that over with in the holidays then they aren't missing out on important learning time...

@js87 schools will no longer have the legal powers to ask children to isolate after Monday, these were delegated from NHS track and trace, so if a school did ask your child to isolate next week, if would have no legal basis at all

Sorry op, could get a phone call at the weekend or next week though. If a child gets positive within 48 hours of being in school bubble will still have to isolate. Happened to us recently. Someone in sons bubble got ill on Sunday, positive results on the Monday. Had to isolate from last contact.

Ds was sent home (with half of his year) this morning, so thats it for the school year.

It's a giving with one hand and taking with the other thing, though, isn't it?

If your children stay in school next week when they would previously have been sent home, they are more likely to actually get infected.

if they show symptoms, then they still have to isolate, and so do you, until 16th August. Even after 16th August, if they are ill, they still have to isolate. So while 'contact' isolation will go down, 'actual infection' isolation will go up - unless , of course, parents refuse to test and send symptomatic children into school exactly as they have been doing all year

@kakey1294129
yes I guess you could get a call this weekend from school, maybe I’ve gone too soon with my relief and excitement! Hopefully not though…

I think it is also somewhat optimistic to assume that the guidance as produced today will be in force except very briefly in September (remember the one-day-in-school-to-spread-Covid fiasco that was January).

It will depend how the summer pans out, but if cases and hospitalisations continue to rise - and are followed by at least some increase in deaths - as Whitty and others believe over the summer, then it may be that the consequences of allowing infections to run undetected and unchecked in schools in September are sufficiently unpalatable even to this Government for guidance to change.

If they do change the guidance, it will be almost certainly be the night before term starts, or rather a week after state schools start but just as private schools return.

I have one finishing next Wednesday and the other next Thursday. One has had to isolate recently and the other is currently isolating. There's also covid cases at work so there's a risk I'll be the one being told to isolate!

I can't relax yet!

"I’m now totally confused as to what happens if a school does send children home next week. Would it be just for home learning or would they need to isolate?"

Schools should only be sending children home next week if there is a staffing problem.

And those children won't need to self isolate.

@Sleepyblueocean

"I’m now totally confused as to what happens if a school does send children home next week. Would it be just for home learning or would they need to isolate?"

Schools should only be sending children home next week if there is a staffing problem.

A staffing problem is, of course, quite likely - if a member of staff knows that a pupil they have been a close contact to has tested positive, then THEY are a close contact so the member of staff HAS to isolate (until August 16th).

Those with symptoms or a positive test aside.

DD’s school break up next Friday. Everything remaining as is for bubbles until that date for our school. Sadly too late for DD as her bubble collapsed on Thursday and now she can’t go back to school until September. To be honest I’m glad its happened now as she’s now be free from isolation when the actual holidays start!

PHE have asked our local high school to provide details on close contacts for two weeks after the end of term.

@GiantToadstool

Wow if isolation of child contacts stops completely in August (is it for adults too?) It will truly rip through schools. I assume thats the plan?

There's not much point delaying the inevitable... it may as well pass through in a couple of weeks rather than schools limping along for yet another year, and just prolonging the agony.

So what should unvaccinated CEV children do in September? Not attend school until it has 'ripped through' their particular setting?

track and trace take over from Monday

Goodness, Royal Mail are going to be very busy

If we kept cases low through sensible controls and vaccinated all 12-17 year olds, secondary schools at least would be much better off and wouldn't have to have weeks / months of total shambles at the start of next year... not to mention the additional hospitalisations and deaths in the wider community due to having such a huge pool of infected people going home every afternoon....

I’m hoping so op we have a week left and I very much want to make it to end!

A staffing problem is, of course, quite likely -" if a member of staff knows that a pupil they have been a close contact to has tested positive, then THEY are a close contact so the member of staff HAS to isolate (until August 16th)."

Does that work the other way? A pupil being close to a member of staff that tests positive? Ds goes to special school so there is lots of physical contact with staff, not so much with other children or at least not enough to count under the new close contact guidelines.

Next term, the answer will be no, as my understanding is that children under 18 and double jabbed adults will not have to isolate whatever happens.

This week? I would hope that a school would let you know, whatever the 'legal' position might be.

@cantkeepawayforever

So what should unvaccinated CEV children do in September? Not attend school until it has 'ripped through' their particular setting?

The guidance for all CEV people, especially children , absolutely stinks. 'Stay away from anyone not vaccinated' How?????

Exactly, Piggy. So a CEV child should stay away from their siblings? A CEV adult should stay away from their children? A CEV teacher should not go to work? No CEV person should go into shops, on public transport or to any of the places that current guidance makes reasonably safe and possible?

It perpetuates the myth that CEV people are 'other' - that they are elderly, chronically sick, already incapacitated, not economically active, not young enough to have children or be children. It's MAD.