"Forcing children to self isolate was needless"

[Greentrees2021]

News today of Oxford study that has found daily testing of children who are contacts to be just as effective at stopping spread as 10 day isolations.

The results show "98.4% of children sent home never went on to develop Covid."

I think many parents have known this anecdotally for a long time.

What I am worried about is that this Oxford University study compared isolating to testing contacts and found no difference. However where was the control group of "do nothing"? It really worries me that we are not trialling a 3rd option which is isolate the child with symptoms and let the other kids get on with life. 98.4% aren't catching it anyway and others that do will show symptoms and can then isolate themselves?! Why are we persisting with all this testing without conclusively proving that there's a value to that?

I guess they didn’t want to chance doing nothing in case the study showed that testing replacing isolation was too risky.

With these results they may well now test doing nothing. Who knows.

It wasn't needless, it was precautionary. This is how science works - you care for people whilst studying.

You might be happy for your kid to catch it but I don't agree with the mad do nothing approach.

They did it the other way with care homes, that didn't work out well.

" However where was the control group of "do nothing"?

Probably not as simple as that; there are ethical considerations in knowingly ignoring infections without any measures at all.

If your going to point out flaws you might highlight that this was mostly collected for the alpha variant and we know delta is a different beast altogether.

Anecdotally, some aspects never seemed to make much sense e.g isolating kids who have previously tested positive.

It is all moot now anyway as self isolating bubbles for children isn't happening next term

Self isolating for nursery children is happening until next month though - as we discovered last night 😩

I am skeptical and wonder if this study was based old varient not delta .
As on the ground 9 cases in my sons bubble and I know of freinds kids multiple cases same class which implies it is transmissible..
Classrooms are badly ventilated.
No masks or distance I feel government spin trying reassure parents we don't need to do anything for kids.
Spend zero money on kids as they don't catch covid or get that ill.

Good news that the trial had such good results. Especially for those of us whose governments still haven’t decided whether children will still be asked to self-isolate next year.

@girlmom21 depends on your nursery. Ours has stopped it now. You only have to isolate if you get told to by test and trace.

Yes agree re. Alpha Vs Delta

Imagine Delta in the classroom with no isolation or testing

The people who want that need therapy imo, they have issues.

@SwanShaped ours are notifying them apparently, and closing the nursery for the 10 days. Good point though, I forgot she only has to isolate once they've been in touch

It must be based primarily on Delta - it's April to June 2021.

Seems like every nursery is doing it differently now.

This might be useful when Alpha, or a variant with Alpha levels of transmission is the dominant strain.

Also it will need to read alongside the more recent research which is showing that the most likely place to be infected is within your own home, and that it is now a child who is most likely to be the first cases in the home.

It's less clear whether that's simply a reflection of earlier school closure and/or a precautionary approach to school contact isolation (ie earlier studies flawed because pupils weren't in school either at all or when cases found there).

Actually - that study couldn’t for ethical reasons test a “do nothing” option.

Also, it didn’t answer the question if either of those options were good in themselves or if both were rubbish options 🤷🏻‍♀️

@BabycakesMatlala

It must be based primarily on Delta - it's April to June 2021.

That would make it more Alpha, Delta didn't take over as main strain that long ago?

Delta took over as main strain during trial. There was a row about that at the time because some people felt that made it unethical to continue.

Have checked - early June Delta became main strain nationally but was not evenly distributed so this study was mainly Alpha.

Plus agree no evidence to say either strategy actually works in comparison to a school.with masks, space and ventilation.

But hey, we have clean hands!

Our kids have been so badly let down by this bunch of bastards government.

On day 9 of isolating my reception child this is music to my ears. This is only his second time isolating luckily but the first one meant missing Christmas Day which was day 10.

No one else in his class the first time caught covid, and no one else so far has caught it this time either.

Delta didn't seem to spread at DS's school. One pupil tested positive 2 weeks before summer holidays started (different year group to DS) but it didn't transmit to any other pupils. That was the only case in the entire school between April and July.

I'm not sure it was needless, I have a child isolating right now, after a delta case in class. Day 1 of isolation we get another child infected, day 2 four more kids come down with it, day 3 another three... it is massively infectious, in a poorly ventilated environment with no masks, like some awful Petri dish science experiment

Ds' bubble burst last Thursday. We isolated, as did all the other kids in his primary class. Ds developed symptoms on Wednesday, despite having little or no contact with the other child. That's at least 4 kids, that I know of, who've caught it. That's the fastest I've seen it spread in a school group all year.

One size doesn't fit all, if the conditions are right it'll spread.

Ventilation a huge problem and most schools are lacking.

Sanitation - well that's really all a bit hit and miss, as one persons "clean"
Isn't always another's

Kids breathe, cough on, lick each other

Thanks for the replies. The ethical point is a good one but I hope they can test the do nothing approach at some point. DD is on last day of 10 days isolation. Boy in her infant school class positive. Tiny classroom all sat together. No one is has caught it so far. Just the thought of daily tests on 30 children for 10 days - 300 tests for what? Such a huge environmental and financial cost. Would much rather the money be plugged into NHS for cancer treatments or something or back into schools for better resources

My alpha bubble experience- year 12 - no one else got infected.

My delta bubble experience- year 6- is that 1 child infected 7 others and a double vaccinated teacher. This study was not fully tracking delta and is therefore already obsolete.

I think the cost of 300 tests is well worth it if it would potentially prevent one case in an adult requiring sick pay.

We just can't deal with Covid on the cheap, it costs a lot because it needs doing right (not that we are doing it right, but I mean there is no budget option).

I'm not sure either approach did a great job of keeping cases low, tbh? Repeated isolations are something we need to avoid at all costs though.