What do we do if cases rocket in September?

[ncnoclue]

If schools etc being closed means that cases massively drop and we can in fact, live normal lives. And then once they go back, they shoot up again and we can't cope.

Is the plan to keep everything else closed, just to keep schools open? So even though everyone who wants it has been vaccinated and there's no other answer, we keep the economy closed indefinitely to keep schools open?!

Well yes it is, if it's correct ... it's just that not much else from him seems to have been, so I'm not getting excited quite yet

Just read this. Hope gov put in some safety measures in school in September if the cases are still high. I really don't want any children suffer unnecessarily. It's wrong to risk even small number of children go through it.
neurosciencenews.com/covid-neurology-children-18933/

To be fair, the SAGE scientists are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

They know that if they dare to express concern or caution about the situation, they'll receive death threats.

They know that if they dare to express concern or caution about the situation, they'll receive death threats

Deepti must be inundated then. Although she's obviously not in real SAGE.

@Puzzledandpissedoff

Seems Ferguson has just said the pandemic may well be over by October: www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/uk-coronavirus-pandemic-over-september-vaccines-neil-ferguson-b947801.html

Coming from him, you have to laugh; if you didn't you'd cry

From the Telegraph

Prof Ferguson, from Imperial College London, and a member of a committee within the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "We need to remain cautious, especially with the potential increase in contact rates again as the weather becomes less fine and schools return.

"We're not completely out of the woods, but the equation has fundamentally changed. The effect of vaccines is hugely reducing the risk of hospitalisations and death.

"And I'm positive that by late September or October time we will be looking back at most of the pandemic. We will have Covid with us, we will still have people dying from Covid, but we'll have put the bulk of the pandemic behind us."

NB he did not say it would be completely over

(Ferguson) did not say it would be completely over

I know, herecomesthsun, which is why I didn't say he did

However I'd expect that even Ferguson has the wit to know how his words will be taken - assuming anyone's still listening to him at all, which frankly I'm not confident about

[quote roguetomato]Just read this. Hope gov put in some safety measures in school in September if the cases are still high. I really don't want any children suffer unnecessarily. It's wrong to risk even small number of children go through it.
neurosciencenews.com/covid-neurology-children-18933/[/quote]
What were the characteristics and co-morbidity of those hospitalised? And the ones who developed complications? Vaccination is recommended for over 12s with neurological conditions and learning disabilities as a result of analysis of those who were hospitalised.

@Puzzledandpissedoff

(Ferguson) did not say it would be completely over

I know, herecomesthsun, which is why I didn't say he did

However I'd expect that even Ferguson has the wit to know how his words will be taken - assuming anyone's still listening to him at all, which frankly I'm not confident about

he is saying we may have come through the worst of it by October, which is different to "may well be over"

I agree he is probably used to being misquoted

*Its staggering they not offering jabs to teens this summer and adding

Do you have any idea what it would take to "add in ventilation" to 32,028 schools over a 6 week period?

I'm not saying school buildings shouldn't be better built, healthier environments, but loads of them apparently don't even meet standard building regs.

boldfail

Its staggering they not offering jabs to teens this summer and adding in extra ventilation.

I think making school buildings a healthier environment would be a great investment for the future.

To be honest, a lot could have been done in the past 18 months, no?

As regards vaccines, I suspect that there is an issue around supply. Although there seems to be a slow uptake in the young 18+ tranche, so one approach might be to speed up the offer to vulnerable 12+s, no idea why this isn't being done.

I think we are at the stage that we just have to add covid to our list of endemic diseases and get on with life. Vaccination along the lines of the flu vaccine for the more vulnerable, the rest of us just get it, no need to isolate etc. just another mostly mild illness. I don't stay at home with a cold or whatever (own office) I just put a sign on the door telling people not to come in!

To me it’s interesting that in the us which has been most pro continued school closures the cdc has said yes masks but otherwise all children back in school for full time learning from September!.

I am unconvinced that we will not look odd for our place in the world if we go for school closures in September Europe will not (most of our obvious countaparts such as france, Italy, Spain are much more pro keeping schools open) and if the us does follow we would be an outlier to still be shutting down education (and yes I include “smaller classes” as shutting down as the only way to get smaller classes is to exclude half of the kids from school, usually those whose parents do the wrong job!- unless we could double teachers overnight which we cannot).

I think it’s unlikely therefore we will not see a full opening to all pupils full time in September although no never say never.

@herecomesthsun

I think making school buildings a healthier environment would be a great investment for the future.

To be honest, a lot could have been done in the past 18 months, no?

As regards vaccines, I suspect that there is an issue around supply. Although there seems to be a slow uptake in the young 18+ tranche, so one approach might be to speed up the offer to vulnerable 12+s, no idea why this isn't being done.

Yes of course. I think that too (re the past 18 months).

However from what I have learnt from speaking to an engineer friend, is that it's a massively costly and complex business. Asbestos for example - many schools are often full of it - which isn't a massive problem if it's not disturbed. Which it would be if ventilation works were started. In such schools it's more of a case of knocking them down and starting again.

Just to stress, this was just something I picked up in a conversation the other day.

We can't improve ventilation in schools because it would disturb the asbestos is an interesting view.

In my classroom the asbestos was in the floor tiles and what was needed to improve ventilation was to fix the blinds. In others it would be to fix the windows.

The idea that to improve ventilation requires knocking down schools ignores the fact that there are many quick fixes which aren't being implemented.

Oh here she is.

No one else is allowed to express an opinion on school buildings. Not even structural engineers.

@Dghgcotcitc

To me it’s interesting that in the us which has been most pro continued school closures the cdc has said yes masks but otherwise all children back in school for full time learning from September!.

I am unconvinced that we will not look odd for our place in the world if we go for school closures in September Europe will not (most of our obvious countaparts such as france, Italy, Spain are much more pro keeping schools open) and if the us does follow we would be an outlier to still be shutting down education (and yes I include “smaller classes” as shutting down as the only way to get smaller classes is to exclude half of the kids from school, usually those whose parents do the wrong job!- unless we could double teachers overnight which we cannot).

I think it’s unlikely therefore we will not see a full opening to all pupils full time in September although no never say never.

it's interesting that the US have vaccinating all their teenagers and are strongly considering vaccinating younger kids.

In light of that, they wouldn't want to isolate kids would they?

We will be an outlier because of our vaccination policy.

@HesterShaw1

Oh here she is.

No one else is allowed to express an opinion on school buildings. Not even structural engineers.

you are allowed to express an opinion - and so is she

Well quite. She does so very frequently, but it doesn't seem like she likes other opinions.

:)

A structural engineer probably doesn't know about my broken blinds.

We've not even broken up yet around here - can we have at least a couple of days without the fucking doom mongering!

Six weeks is a long time. Cases have plummeted, meaning there are fewer infectious people around to infect others so it's equally possible there won't be a spike in infections. Threads like this do nothing other than upset those with existing anxiety.