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Original poster

If the government were honest about the next 4 months

563 replies

RuleWithAWoodenFoot · 27/08/2021 12:10

They'd say that children are probably going to catch covid, there is nothing to stop this happening. Lots of families will probably catch it off their children, school staff will probably catch it off children too.

Education is going to be disrupted again if the above happens. No way around it. But it could be 'over' by November when the bad weather kicks in and older folk start getting ill as per usual circumstances. At that point booster vaccs could start.

It's definitely 'an approach', but not telling people that this is the plan is unfair. Do you think people have realised this yet? Or are the Emperor's new clothes still in view?

OP posts:
TheHoneyBadger · 29/08/2021 23:58

Yes, whilst I hope schools can stay open everyone should be thinking of contingency plans given how it was all systems go for the first day of term in January and all schools closed the next day. Surely people have learned that just because the government is saying something with utter conviction today doesn't mean they won't u-turn on it completely tomorrow.

Backofbeyond50 · 30/08/2021 00:53

Not testing doesn’t stop cases.
Your asymptomatic daughter comes into school and passes it on. Three teachers (all vaccinated) catch it, days apart. They don’t need hospitalisation but two feel pretty grotty. One has ten days off, one needs two weeks and the third is sick for three weeks. There is disruption
Exactly and this is really pissing me off tbh. Dd is year 13 and missed her GCSES and had one periods of isolation due to a teacher contracting COVID. But that was the thin end of the disruption. Most of the disruption was due to her teachers being pulled to teach or cover lower years.
The argument is of course that this will stop but will it if more teachers contract COVID due to its prevalence, no isolating and selfish parents sending in positive kids or refusing to test.

Backofbeyond50 · 30/08/2021 01:08

@MilesJuppIsMyBitch yep CEV like you and my dh are just low hanging fruit apparently who have to hope and pray the vaccine works for them. The law of natural selection is also frequently mentioned on these types if threads.
Incidentally no whiff of a vaccine invite for my 12 to 15 year old despite having an ECV immunosupressed parent.

walksen · 30/08/2021 06:33

"The argument is of course that this will stop but will it if more teachers contract COVID due to its prevalence, no isolating and selfish parents sending in positive kids or refusing to test."

I think a lot of teachers have been infected already and had 2 jabs so we can hope they won't catch it again. If immunity wanes we may see this from January onwards. Let's hope not!

Out of staff of 70 I can count on the fingers of one hand staff at my school who didn't catch it in the last academic year.

twinkletoesimnot · 30/08/2021 06:41

@Peteycat

Look. I have posted gov.uk guidance. Can't get any clearer than that. That's what they recommend. That's what is happening from next week. That's what is pretty much indefinite from now on. If things change in the governments eyes, small changes will happen for short bursts.
😂😂😂 'Can't get clearer than that.' Please! It's a load of drivel that someone has been paid a fortune for, when they might as well have said 'We really don't give a shit, just get on with it.'
beentoldcomputersaysno · 30/08/2021 08:28

There are a couple of posters on here who don't care if infect, dismiss long covid, dismiss neurological studies, can't see impact of mass infection on health, nhs, economy etc...is one of you Alison Pearson or another member of us4them?

sherrystrull · 30/08/2021 08:58

I still can't get past the easy way posters talk about school staff contracting covid as a given and are so blasé about it.

Waxonwaxoff0 · 30/08/2021 09:00

@sherrystrull

I still can't get past the easy way posters talk about school staff contracting covid as a given and are so blasé about it.
It's a given that we will all get it at some point, especially for those of us who work out of the home. I caught it myself at work. I don't understand people thinking we can run forever from a virus.
Thewiseoneincognito · 30/08/2021 09:28

@sherrystrull

I still can't get past the easy way posters talk about school staff contracting covid as a given and are so blasé about it.
Even worse are those who ‘claim’ to be teachers themselves saying they’re not overly bothered and are happy to go back into classrooms with no mitigation in place except hopes and prayers.

The blasé attitudes do make you go hmmm 🧐 are they really teachers?

sherrystrull · 30/08/2021 09:32

I'm not trying to run from the virus. I've had it at least once.

It's more the way people talk about school staff getting the virus as if it's a given. As though disruption to education with all staff off poorly at some point is accepted as going to happen. I've seen some staff incredibly poorly, still recovering over a year later and with family members who sadly passed away from it.

I notice CEV adults and children are treated the same.

Backofbeyond50 · 30/08/2021 09:39

Now I don't think alm that many teachers and school have had it in our area. The mitigations they adopted and maybe luck kept cases fairly low. In the school community. Most of the cases seemed to originate from a sleepover held on October Half Term.

borntobequiet · 30/08/2021 09:40

I’m waiting for someone to say we should all just “lean in” to Covid.

minipie · 30/08/2021 10:37

sherrystrull I think it’s a given that most will get covid this autumn. I’m not blasé about it and fully appreciate CEV people (including my mum for example) must be very worried, I do feel for them.

I just think there’s no other option now. It’s too widespread, too contagious and too undetectable due to lots of asymptomatic cases. The only way to contain it (to some extent) would be a full on lockdown again, schools shut etc, and I don’t think we can take that as a country.

Warhertisuff · 30/08/2021 10:49

@minipie

sherrystrull I think it’s a given that most will get covid this autumn. I’m not blasé about it and fully appreciate CEV people (including my mum for example) must be very worried, I do feel for them.

I just think there’s no other option now. It’s too widespread, too contagious and too undetectable due to lots of asymptomatic cases. The only way to contain it (to some extent) would be a full on lockdown again, schools shut etc, and I don’t think we can take that as a country.

I agree. The measures that people are suggesting we put in place can only slow it down... We'd need another lockdown to significantly suppress numbers - one which people will inevitably be less compliant with - and then what... As soon as we open up, we restart the cycle.

Allowing it to pass through schools in the first half of the autumn term is the least worst option, but I think measures need to be put into place to help protect those who have immune deficiency over this time (eg hubs where these children can be taught in settings with very strict Covid mitigations) and then they can rejoin once the wave has crashed through and cases subside, hopefully this side of Christmas.

Arguably this would be safer than insisting on masks, contact isolations and mass testing, for those pupils, as all the mitigations would be doing was extending the period of risk, not reducing it in absolute terms.

TheKeatingFive · 30/08/2021 10:51

I also agree with minipie

walksen · 30/08/2021 10:55

"The blasé attitudes do make you go hmmm 🧐 are they really teachers"

I got infected as a teacher as did many many of my colleagues. 6 people in my dept got positive tests over a 2 week period. I suffered from fatigue for 6 months.

I think you do get to the point about being blase because it's not something you can constantly worry about. Kids have never been obliged to wear masks anywhere ( the guidance for them has always been no stricter than for shops etc at the moment). Social distancing in schools is impossible and all you hear is that schools are safe, transmission never happens inside it's down the community but parents shouldn't congregate at school gates guidance from govt keeps schools safe etc etc. At the end of the day the government decided that kids in schools was worth the risk to staff and vulnerable relations and that's that. You get used to the idea of taking your chances, do what you can but realise that you will catch it eventually and have to get used to the idea.

Right now the government approach is to let it spread and trust in the vaccine wall. You have little control over that. Most people are better off now that when we got sent back in September because at least the vaccines tilt the odds in your favour

sherrystrull · 30/08/2021 11:05

I have made peace with getting it. I've had it.

I just think it's easy for posters to state that school staff, their families, CEV adults and CEV children need to just get on with it and that they 'feel for them'.

I had a long conversation with a relative yesterday about how he is going back to the office two days a week with some staff not going back as they are too nervous and them all having the option to work from home. It feels like a different world.

The stress of working in a classroom and never knowing if people you care about are going to get very ill or pass it to their relatives who might get very ill is massive.

Waxonwaxoff0 · 30/08/2021 11:17

@sherrystrull

I have made peace with getting it. I've had it.

I just think it's easy for posters to state that school staff, their families, CEV adults and CEV children need to just get on with it and that they 'feel for them'.

I had a long conversation with a relative yesterday about how he is going back to the office two days a week with some staff not going back as they are too nervous and them all having the option to work from home. It feels like a different world.

The stress of working in a classroom and never knowing if people you care about are going to get very ill or pass it to their relatives who might get very ill is massive.

Unfortunately that is going to be the case though. I'm not a teacher but I work out of the home (factory), there ARE some jobs where you are more likely to catch Covid than other jobs. That's just the way it is. Is it fair, probably not, but life is never fair.
magsbagsfags · 30/08/2021 11:17

The only way forward is to vaccinate adults (and/or children), keep up twice weekly testing in schools and let it rip.

There are no other viable solutions.

What exactly do you suggest? Being in lockdown forever?? Don't be so utterly ridiculous.

The lockdowns were in place so that the NHS wasn't overwhelmed whilst a vaccine was developed and rolled out.

Yes, probably most will catch it. But for children and healthy vaccinated adults it should be a mild illness.

Flu isn't a walk in a park either but we live with it.

minipie · 30/08/2021 11:19

I just think it's easy for posters to state that school staff, their families, CEV adults and CEV children need to just get on with it and that they 'feel for them'.

Well what would you suggest sherrystrull? Are you in favour of another full lockdown? It’s also very easy to criticise and say how stressful it all is without making any practical suggestions.

magsbagsfags · 30/08/2021 11:19

And the disruption over the last 18 months to education has be necessary but appalling.

The government are 100% right that we just need to get on with it. Do away with bubbles and close contacts and just get on with it.

I am guessing you're not vaccinated OP? Otherwise you wouldn't be scaremongering.

Because I agree with you that the plan will probably pan out as you suggest. But I 100% agree with it.

Panicmode1 · 30/08/2021 11:26

My son returned from a school DoE trip last week and tested positive 2 days later. As our house isn't huge we have all been in contact with him. Of the 6 of us in the family, aside from him, 2 are positive with zero symptoms and 3 are negative. Track and Trace were useless with what the three of us should do with regards to LFT testing, and my GP said guidance from PHE is changing 'almost daily', but advised testing every day.

I think it is certainly going to be a rocky autumn, and with 2 of my 4 children missing their first day's back, and Reading kids returning today, schools are going to be disrupted for a few weeks to come, despite best efforts.

beentoldcomputersaysno · 30/08/2021 11:31

The government response of just get on with it makes it an outlier in many other countries. 10,000 kids hospitalised in UK, many many more with long covid and as a country we minimise that and do nothing?

Warhertisuff · 30/08/2021 11:35

@beentoldcomputersaysno

The government response of just get on with it makes it an outlier in many other countries. 10,000 kids hospitalised in UK, many many more with long covid and as a country we minimise that and do nothing?
10,000 kids hospitalised? Where did you get that from.

What's your suggestion then given that anything short of a full lockdown will
just slow the spread not reverse it.

BustopherPonsonbyJones · 30/08/2021 11:39

@minipie

I just think it's easy for posters to state that school staff, their families, CEV adults and CEV children need to just get on with it and that they 'feel for them'.

Well what would you suggest sherrystrull? Are you in favour of another full lockdown? It’s also very easy to criticise and say how stressful it all is without making any practical suggestions.

Vaccinate all secondary school children who wish to be vaccinated (their choice, not their parents). Priority boosters for teachers, six months after the last jab (as in Israel). Ventilation and warm clothes (no closing windows in classrooms because it is a bit chilly). Pay for ventilation if windows don’t open. Compulsory testing at least once a week (as I am fairly shocked by some Mumsnetters who intend to send their sick children into school).

Masks - personal choice. I’ll wear mine at school.

I don’t think it needs a lockdown - if we are sensible.