Schools - we just have to bite the bullet...

[Warhertisuff]

It's completely futile to think we can stop Covid spreading through schools in the longer term. Who are we trying to kid? We may be angry that we are in this situation, but we are and we have to live with it.

It seems to be that it will be far better all round if Covid is just treated as we would the flu in schools. From September all teachers and CEV pupils should have been vaccinated, so we may as well just let it happen, with children off school when they are too unwell to attend. At least that way, disruption will be minimised and concentrated into a few weeks at the start of term.

Oh let me “scream” long covid, having seen ds go through it for a year. (and why the ridiculous emotive language? It’s so immature. No-one’s “screaming”, they’re raising points.)

Here’s a thread for the nudge unit to ignore/deride (they won’t be right, but that never stops them.)

mobile.twitter.com/dgurdasani1/status/1417513507935948810

So sorry to hear that ArseintheCoOpwindow 💐

Thank you for starting this thread OP. It is interesting to read people’s point of view and I can see in the short time you have been with us that you have taken a keen interest in Coronavirus so interesting to see your current thoughts, food for thought for us all.

So what is the alternative plan? If we don’t go down the route suggested in the OP, how do we manage Covid in the school environment? Given that the current systems of bouncing in and out of remote learning, and isolating huge numbers of perfectly healthy young people is clearly not a viable proposition going forward, what do we do instead?

There's a certain group of people who like to paint themselves as having a 'sensible' approach to the pandemic while making out that anyone who disagrees with them is 'hysterical', 'screaming' or 'terrified'.

As if it's somehow not reasonable to have concerns

Amazing as humans how we seem to have normalised and accepted hospitalisation, deaths, and long covid.

[quote DumplingsAndStew]**@bluetongue

Yes, some will scream ‘what about the children’ and ‘what about long covid’ but those with health anxiety will just have to work through it.

Sorry, are you suggesting Long Covid is a mental health issue? What is your basis for this?

And on the subject of mental health issues, do you think they can all be solved by "work[ing] through it"?[/quote]
Yes, I’d be interested to hear this too @bluetongue
Given the myriad physical symptoms ds has been dealing with for a year, it would be enlightening to hear how that’s either health anxiety on his side, or how posters acknowledging that a real illness is real is health anxiety?

I think this is the plan, OP.

I agree that a lot of people, particularly on here, are still quite far from accepting it.

@TheOnlyLivingBoyInNewCross

So what is the alternative plan? If we don’t go down the route suggested in the OP, how do we manage Covid in the school environment? Given that the current systems of bouncing in and out of remote learning, and isolating huge numbers of perfectly healthy young people is clearly not a viable proposition going forward, what do we do instead?

The OP suggests that we can do it from September 'because CEV children will have been vaccinated' which isn't true so is a non-starter of an argument.

You can't acknowledge that CEV children are an issue then dismiss that issue with a lie.

For those of you who don't think the OP is reasonable - this IS the plan for schools in September. It's not some hypothetical 'thing that will never happen'. It's the plan.

No mitigations (except if individual heads take their statutory Health & Safety duty seriously) - not even as many as schools have had (ever had SD, never had masks in primary).

No isolations.

No ability to compel children who have Covid symptoms to test (or even, in many cases, to get parents to collect them from school, which has increasingly been refused by parents).

No vaccinations (CEV children in primary have the unenviable choice of coming into a school that is dangerous to them or isolating for half a decade....)

Please DO treat it like 'flu - every adult n the school, and every child in the year group I teach in was vaccinated very early in the Autumn term for flu. I'd take that....

@noblegiraffe

You can't acknowledge that CEV children are an issue then dismiss that issue with a lie.

To be fair, this kind of thing has worked well for Johnson so I guess people will follow our esteemed leader’s example.

It's not quite the plan, cant as at the moment the suggestion is that pupils with covid have to isolate.

Yes we are far less likely to know who they are due to lack of testing but there will still be some kids isolating due to testing positive.

The OP wants to do away with even that. Known positive cases in school.

Please DO treat it like 'flu - every adult n the school, and every child in the year group I teach in was vaccinated very early in the Autumn term for flu. I'd take that....

Well said @cantkeepawayforever

Pretty much every time I post about ds’s covid/long covid, someone pops up with “but other viruses trigger post viral illnesses!” Well, yes, they do. And we vaccinate against the vast majority of them. Flu, measles, mumps, rubella, meningitis, HPV, TB. Even chicken pox has a vaccine now. What prevalent disease are we not vaccinating kids against? Glandular fever perhaps? Not sure if there tend to be thousands of cases of that a day though. Never had a good answer to that one.

@noblegiraffe

It's not quite the plan, cant as at the moment the suggestion is that pupils with covid have to isolate.

Yes we are far less likely to know who they are due to lack of testing but there will still be some kids isolating due to testing positive.

The OP wants to do away with even that. Known positive cases in school.

In primary, IME no children are taken for testing, as their symptoms are not the 'classic' ones. We have not had a case that has been discovered 'directly' - only ones found through whole family testing after an elder sibling or parent has tested positive.

So in primary at least, the OP is exactly the plan.

Just seen on twitter that no one told health professionals that CEV children should be vaccinated until the JCVI report was released on Monday. Desperate parents contacting GPs have been told that there's no way to book them onto the system because they haven't had confirmation from government.

Even getting a first jab by September is looking difficult, and of course Delta needs two.

I know Covid is a potentially serious disease but you can’t compare it with cancer
Actually, I think you can. It's not the same of course, but Covid can kill quicker than cancer, and not enough time has elapsed to assess the possibly permanent effects of long covid.

I can't believe they are not even offering the exam years the vaccine.
Some students do feel quite ill with Covid for a week or 2. At least that would be one less thing to disrupt their studies and exams, after 2 disrupted school years already.
I worry that the schools will still close year groups down and revert to online learning. That is what they are doing now, despite being told weeks ago to stop sending home whole year groups. Apparently PHE and DfE do not see eye to eye on this issue and PHE and school have disregarded the instruction and over 1 million children are self isolating. What if schools disregard the instructions in September also?

That is what they are doing now, despite being told weeks ago to stop sending home whole year groups.

That is what you have been told they are doing now.

It hasn't been the policy to send home bubbles in secondary since the end of September last year. The average number of kids sent home in secondary before Christmas per positive case was about 24. The DfE have (probably deliberately) stopped publishing that figure.

The Government will change the controls that apply in early years, schools, colleges and higher education institutions to maintain a baseline of protective measures while maximising attendance and minimising disruption to children and young people’s education. The Government’s intention is that from step 4 children will no longer need to be in consistent groups (‘bubbles’), and early years settings, schools or colleges will not be required to routinely carry out contact tracing, which will help to minimise the number of children isolating. Contact tracing in specific educational settings would only be triggered if deemed necessary in response to a local outbreak.

The Government also intends to exempt under 18s who are close contacts of a positive case from the requirement to self-isolate, in line with the approach for those who are fully vaccinated (as set out below). Further detail will be published in due course and the changes are likely to come into effect later in the summer. There will be no restrictions on in-person teaching and learning in universities.

The Government intends to exempt people who have been fully vaccinated from the requirement to self-isolate if they are a contact of a positive case, with a similar exemption for under 18s (as above). Anyone who tests positive will still need to self-isolate regardless of their vaccination status. Further details will be published in due course and the changes are likely to come into effect later in the summer

www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-response-summer-2021-roadmap/covid-19-response-summer-2021

What if schools disregard the instructions in September also?

School heads have a statutory duty, under health sand safety law:

"It is an employer's duty to protect the health, safety and welfare of their employees and other people who might be affected by their business. Employers must do whatever is reasonably practicable to achieve this. This means making sure that workers and others are protected from anything that may cause harm, effectively controlling any risks to injury or health that could arise in the workplace."

This duty over-ride guidance from the DfE - if an employer decides that the current guidance presents too great a risk to health (to both their employees- staff- and others -students) then they MUST take further measures.

"it will be a nightmare for staff in schools. School I used to work in will have the tas doing the 15 minute obs like they haven't already got enough to do trying to help pupils learn, intensive physio after surgery, personal care, gastro feeds, suction and more."

Lots of those who don't work with or have a teenager with a neurodisability will not understand how logistically difficult it is to vaccinate that group of children.
You cannot just take them down to the nearest vaccination centre. Mine has not even been through the GPs door in years.

My friend works in a school and said they are keeping the current rules with bubbles and isolating etc!!!

If that is the case for many schools they need to start thinking about the next set of exams and if they can go ahead as nothing seems to be improving!

@noblegiraffe

That is what they are doing now, despite being told weeks ago to stop sending home whole year groups.

That is what you have been told they are doing now.

It hasn't been the policy to send home bubbles in secondary since the end of September last year. The average number of kids sent home in secondary before Christmas per positive case was about 24. The DfE have (probably deliberately) stopped publishing that figure.

That is what you have been told they are doing now*

Data is currently over 1 million pupils out of school self-isolating for 81,000 positive cases.
So I think they are sending home whole years.
Certainly since the DfE said top stop doing this, my DC's year group of over 200 got sent home en masse.

@Warhertisuff

It's completely futile to think we can stop Covid spreading through schools in the longer term. Who are we trying to kid? We may be angry that we are in this situation, but we are and we have to live with it.

It seems to be that it will be far better all round if Covid is just treated as we would the flu in schools. From September all teachers and CEV pupils should have been vaccinated, so we may as well just let it happen, with children off school when they are too unwell to attend. At least that way, disruption will be minimised and concentrated into a few weeks at the start of term.

Not all teachers would have been vaccinated. I haven't been and several of my colleagues (that I know of) haven't either.

So I think they are sending home whole years.

Yes, when that year group is riddled with covid. Whole schools have also been closing recently because it is impossible to keep them open and staffed.

They are not routinely sending bubbles home for a single case which is certainly the impression that certain groups have been trying to give.

The problem is rampant covid.