Hand, foot and mouth disease at nursery... what do you think of their reaction?

[Jackaroo]

There are two nurseries adjoining/share same playground. Colleague tells me there is a notice on their nursery door saying 4 children have this, but gov.ment guidelines are not to exclude the children.

This notice was in among some that are a year old so colleague didn't notice, until it was pointed out to her. Her ds is already battling an ongoing infection (under paediatrician) and has now had a call from nursery today to say he seems to have this new infection too.

She rang the head of all the nurseries to saying parents should have got a letter each (as we often do about different things). She said
1 - "I followed gov. guidelines"
2 - (shouted down teh phone) "we're not all computer literate you know"...
3 - "Well I wouldn't keep my children at school in this situation"

Also we weren't told anything at our nursery.

Thoughts?

Two quite different thoughts:

• one, coxsackie virus (= hand foot & mouth) is unpleasant, but not a big deal - gp told us pretty much every child (esp. in "group care" setting) gets it, and frequently it's not even noticed. Ds had it at 18 months, when dd was about to be born - I was worried about effect on newborn, and apparently it's not even a problem for those. So don't worry, and tell your friend not to worry (though she might want to double-check with her gp if her child is immune-deficient or otherwise particularly fragile)

• two, nursery head has dreadful dreadful parent-management skills - especially the double-standard re her own children & the virus (which is melodramatic too, see thought one above).

So overall thought: do you like this/these nurseries otherwise? Is this part of a pattern of bad management? Ie, the point here is not the HFM but the business management.

eh? hand foot and mouth isn't that big a deal is it? it's not like the thing cows get.

the guidelines say that they can still go to school/nursery. it's a virus most children will get, nothing to worry about. It's infectious before the symptoms come out anyway.

people are scared of it because of the name and they think it's the same disease cows get.

Thanks for your replies; my issue really was not that disease itself (I do realise it's not the same thing as FMD!!), but the way it was handled.

But I do think that it needs explaining, and the parents given an opportunity to ask questions etc....

I will write, I wasn't sure whether to, but on the back of Bink's reply, I feel that I'm not unreasonable to do so (I should have put it in the "AIBU" column now I htink about it!)............