Not again?

[topoftheworld1]

Would really welcome a bit of advice please.

My 10 year old son recently had covid - he tested positive on 31 January. Isolated for full 10 days. His lateral flows just got fainter and fainter.

We went on holiday over half term and he was definitely testing negative on 16 Feb when we had to test in order to fly.

My son has been a bit sniffly / a little under the weather this week but honestly didn't think much of it. Just been giving him a bit of Calpol before bed etc, he's been going into school.

Son is staying over at his dad's tonight. His dad just messaged me to say he'd done two covid tests on him and both positive.

This has completely thrown me. Surely he can't have covid again so soon?

I've tried looking online for advice but it's not very clear.

Are tonights positive lateral flows a result of the previous infection from a few weeks ago? But if that was the case wouldn't he have carried on testing positive, rather than eventually having negative lateral flows at the end of his isolation?

Am a bit concerned as I work full time and my parents, who are both in their 70s, do a lot of after school childcare for me to help me out. Obviously don't want to put them in a vulnerable position.

I think it’s likely he has caught it again. I’m sorry - that is probably not what you want to hear. But subsequent infections are quite common now.

Ofcorse it’s possible - there are many variants. He’s caught another one.

Why didn’t you test him?

I think he’s got it again. It’s happened to a couple of people I know.

Yes, itspossibke,

And cases are up 46% (the rolling weekly numbers, it was 'only' up 36% on yesterday's) so there is a lot about again.

We'd been down to 347 per 100k last week, but it's back up and now at 409.

(Admissions up 12% and deaths up 19% if you were wondering. Test number marginally down)

These weren't the answers I was hoping for!
Bluebells I didn't test him because it didn't occur to me that he would catch it again a month later.

You are not supposed to test for 90 days as you can get a false positive. Only way to confirm would be to do a pcr.

Yes you can test within 90 days with new symptoms. The child is new symptoms.

@user1471509171, i’ve heard that the PCR is the test that could pick a past infection. Lateral flows are more reliable in this instance.

Regardless, yes, he can catch it again this soon.

A friend of my son’s did too and now the whole family have it.

@user1471509171 I thought the same as you until quite recently, but that’s incorrect- you don’t need to test again in 90 days if you have no new symptoms. If you DO have new symptoms, you should test. This child has new symptoms and therefore should be tested.

Apparently lot of people are now getting the second omicron variant (BA1 vs BA2)

DS is ten and he tested positive 4 weeks after an infection in February. He has full on cold and cough symptoms. It’s rife in his class and school and I’ve just tested positive. I think he probably has it again. We’re assuming it’s the two different variants of omicron.

*Definitely not probably

My daughter had it twice within 4-5 weeks.