Under 18s and close contacts

[CooDeGrass]

As far as I understand it, the rules for school age children who come into contact with a positive test are (a) no need to isolate but (b) get a PCR (even if no symptoms).

But who’s actually responsible for checking which other children those positive cases have been in contact with, and notifying them?

DC have all had multiple close friends/team mates/ classmates etc test positive over the last couple of weeks, but we’ve not “officially” been told about any of them - we’ve found out through kids/parents telling each other.

It doesn’t make much practical difference to us as we’re essentially bathing in Covid soup at this stage, but I’m just curious as to what is supposed to be happening (if anything).

In terms of who's supposed to be responsible, it's now Test & Trace (or whatever they're called). In my experience, and that of other parents I know who are all in a similar situation to you OP, no close contacts are being traced or contacted officially.

I thought at first the government must have changed their definition of 'close contact', but it's still there on the govt. website, if you can find it - within 1m, within 2m for 15 mins or more, travelling in the same vehicle etc.. Test & Trace asked me a very vague question about whether I had contact info for any other children that my covid-positive child had been in close contact with, which I didn't at the time, so they just went on to the next question. I asked if they would be in touch with the school to find out who my child had been in contact with before the positive test, and they said no. And that was that.

Thanks, that sounds (from the limited info I can get from persuading teen DC to actually ask their friends questions about this!) very much what’s been happening here too.

Also fits with the suspicion that there isn’t really any will at all any more to try and mitigate spread in children (to the extent there ever was).