When do you think the testing and keeping home of otherwise healthy people will end?

[MarcelineMissouri]

Ds woke up with a cough yesterday. No other symptoms, perfectly well in himself. And a minor cough that I wouldn’t have given a second thought to 2 years ago.
Got him tested at 930am yesterday. The result still isn’t back so he’s missed a second day of school now and is bouncing off the walls.

Now, regardless of whether or not he tests positive (I think v unlikely, cases are v low in our area) he is basically a healthy child at home instead of school. The vast majority of children I know who have tested positive have been symptomless or nearly symptomless, and yet have to miss over a week of school and stay at home for 10 days. And of course not just children - adults who are perfectly well but picked up by random testing, then stuck at home, often unable to work.

At what point will we stop this and revert back to just staying at home if we feel unwell? This is not sustainable in the long term. I really hope that come spring we move to testing only if you are actually ill.

And before anyone asks, no I’m not sitting pretty working from home, I work in a primary school and have kids all over me every day so I’m well aware of what this could mean in terms of exposure, I just think that at some point soon (after this winter at the latest) we need to revise the testing criteria to only those with symptoms.

Well i doubt it will be before spring. They need to know the NHS can survive winter. Knowing cases predicts likely hospitalisations that will happen over the following few weeks. Isalation of positives goes someway in preventing cases getting too high too quick.
If cases and therefore hospitalisations are getting too high too quick then further measures may be needed to slow spread.
If we get through winter with no major incident then im sure this will be a posibility

There’s still too scope for variants so people need to isolate whilst they have it.

No different than staying home with a sickness bug, chicken pox etc.

@IceCreamAndCandyfloss there is a difference though. People who are vomiting or have chicken pox are sick and unwell. I am taking about people who have no symptoms at all and if they hadn’t tested would never have even known they had it. I’m taking about my son who has a slight cough (and has now tested negative but has missed another 2 days of school) I’m talking about my friends daughter who tested positive at the weekend and only tested because her friend tested positive - she herself hasn’t got a single symptom but is still required to stay at home for 10 days.
You don’t stay at home because you might have chicken pox or because you have a vomiting bug even though you haven’t actually been sick.

I appreciate this is how it is for this winter and start of next year but I’m just saying it’s not sustainable going forwards to keep testing healthy people and to make people stay at home when they are perfectly fine. It’s also not sustainable to keep making kids miss days of school every time they get a minor symptom that they would not previously have needed to miss school for.

I assume it will end when virus is under control and most have immunity through either vaccine or infection.
Asymptomatic child maybe ok for themselves, but those people she/he may spread the virus may not be so lucky.

There wasn’t covid before so not staying home with a cold was very different. Whilst it can make so many ill, long covid or worse of course people shouldn’t mix whilst waiting for a test or positive.
A few days minor inconvenience vs what could happen if allowed to spread to someone vulnerable isn’t much to bear.

It’s all well and good to describe it as a few days inconvenience but if it happens over and over and over it’s a bit more than just a little inconvenience. For children missing school, for parents missing work to look after them, for adults missing work because they have to stay at home when they are perfectly capable of working.
I’m not talking about people who are unwell, but genuinely, baring in mind many people have few or no symptoms, how long do you think it should go on for that healthy people have to stay at home potentially multiple times? How long can businesses cope with that for? How much education is it ok for children to miss? Children missing a couple of days of school every time they get a bit of a cough. People who feel absolutely fine having to stay at home for 10 days. These things matter too, you make it sound a bit like people should carry on with this for years.

But now you don't need to self isolate for close contact if you are vaccinated or under 18. So only people who need to self isolate are the ones with symptoms. And you don't need to stay at home for 10 days if your pcr is negative?

Soon I hope. Does it actually achieve anything at this point ?!

I’ve been wondering this and completely agree with you.
I’m also a primary teacher and a mother to young children and so might be considered at the ‘front line’.
There has got to be a pint at which covid is just another virus and if you’re ill you stay home and off you’re not, you don’t.
I’m hoping sooner rather than later.
I suspect sometime in the spring.

@Megistotherium

But now you don't need to self isolate for close contact if you are vaccinated or under 18. So only people who need to self isolate are the ones with symptoms. And you don't need to stay at home for 10 days if your pcr is negative?

No that's wrong. You could test positive but have no symptoms whatsoever. You still have to stay at home for 10 days. We have no idea whether there are 1000's of people going about their daily lives carrying flu/chickenpox or whatever and able to pass it on but with no symptoms - because we're not testing people who come into contact with these things. Covid is the only illness where we are testing healthy people. The definition of healthy being not having symptoms.

I don't know the answer OP but it needs to happen.

I thought it was over already.

If kids have tested positive but are symptomless they can still spread it, why would you want them to do that?

Hopefully very soon because this is just not sustainable.

2023 barring new variants.

I had covid very mild... as single parent I took my kid to school he had no symptoms... no one in his class got it
All the other classes had it all ready.

I kept away from everyone

It's fine no one in his class got it afterwards

@Chloemol

If kids have tested positive but are symptomless they can still spread it, why would you want them to do that?

We’ve been doing this for 18 months already. We cannot keep pulling healthy kids out of school and healthy adults out of work.

At some point as part of moving on and living with it we surely have to move to only testing if you are actually unwell

Spring 2022, make sure we make it through the winter and flu season.
Very little flu about last winter they'll be expecting a hammering from it this winter and they'll be worried about covid

I think it will naturally drop off. People will stop testing their kids for every little cough, especially with repeated negatives, and it will become something that we only do when they are really ill.

I Agree with you OP, but most people are still furious at the ending of compulsory isolation for (negative) close contacts who are vaccinated or under 18 🤷🏼‍♀️, so doubt there will be much support for this for a while to come…

@Chloemol

If kids have tested positive but are symptomless they can still spread it, why would you want them to do that?

Do you keep them at home for days to make sure they don’t spread any other kind of illness?? For the most part we carry on with our lives - school, work etc unless we are actually ill. There are exceptions obviously- chicken pox etc- but even with that you only stay home if you come out in spots. They could be asymptotically transmitting all sorts of things. I’m not saying we stop yet but we cannot keep on isolating healthy people as though they have the plague. Eventually we have to accept that it will spread.

We cannot keep pulling healthy kids out of school and healthy adults out of work.

I don't see how this is an issue for testing positive.

In the short term, it is rare to have COVID more than once. You would therefore expect to have one period of isolation. This isn't exactly repeatedly "pulling healthy people" out of work/school, particularly when a large proportion of adults & children have tested positive for antibodies and have therefore already been infected once.

My youngest has just had to miss 3 days of school waiting for a test result. Tested due to sister testing positive.
She was negative.
We’ll have to go through the whole thing all over again the next time she has any type of virus, or any of our family, or any of her close friends.
Repeat short periods of isolation are entirely possible.

@ollyollyoxenfree because every time a child waits for the result of a PCR test they have to isolate. As OP explained, this has led to her DS missing 2 days off school. If that happens 5 times, that's the equivalent of two weeks missed of school.
I totally agree with you @MarcelineMissouri We need to stop testing symptomless people and stop isolating unless people are actually ill.
I also don't hide at home. 'Front line' too in an infant school.

Kids don’t have to isolate whilst waiting for PCR results if they are symptomless?

@MustTidyUpMustTidyUp

Kids don’t have to isolate whilst waiting for PCR results if they are symptomless?

School requested that she did so.