school start delay threat - am I alone being worried and annoyed at the prospect of childcare nightmare for working parents?

[exrebel]

I am so worried at the prospect of school start delayed until November. I am screaming insside with worry. How are we going to find childcare? Because some of us will have to go to work. I am applying for jobs at the moment and the last thing I want to say to a new employer is: sorry but there is no school until November so I cant come into work because I cannot find childcare.

I hope it does not come to this, I want to scream at the scientists who are promoting the idea to curb the spread. we are not going to keep our children in quARANTINE are we? They will still be mixing with other children in the park, in play areas, in playdates, and everywhere we take them to keep them entertained. Or for those that can find childcare, with the other children in the group.

has anyone started to think how they are going to cope if they go ahead with the closure?

There are plenty of studies proving school and public place closures reduce fatalities and virus spread. Ach, never mind, whatever....

Ds has been exposed to someone at school whose mother went down with swine flu - obv. her kids were off school for two weeks but presumably she was infectious before she was diagnosed (and her kids had been exposed to the person she caught it from - at a cousin's birthday part).

Also has had contact with another friend who had been exposed to someone who had it. Maybe we were lucky, but in our case we've avoided it so far...

In a way it's good that this has hit us now, when the NHS still has reasonable funding. Because in two years' time the shit will really hit the fan - whatever govt. is in power, the NHS will face serious budget cuts in real terms even if they slash other departments and raise taxes to make up some of the shortfall. At a time when demand for healthcare will be rising...

I don't think you'll notice much change in the nhs under the conservatives, just a lot less pencil pushers.

I don't think Labour have the balls to close everything down, not unless it was in their best interests, but who knows?

My chief economist mate (and lots of other orgs that have crunched the figures) say this will be the worst financial crisis the NHS has ever faced, right back to '48. But we've got until 2011 to prepare...

And everyone is dreaming up ways to get more efficient ready for those circumstances. Not just doing what the NHS already does on the cheap but starting from first principles, e.g. what does a diabetic patient need and how do we meet these needs, rather than 'this is how diabetic services work, how do we save money'.

Fingers crossed it won't be a complete disaster.

and ho ho ho to Tories not changing owt but getting rid of pencil pushers - that's what ALL governments since '48 has promised, reality tends to be rather different (last time Tories were in the dreamed up fundholding which created a boom in pen pushers).

it could also be in decline in meccico because it is currently summer there, as it is here, and in the winter they will see another surge in infections.

There is evidence that school closures reduced the spread in the pandemic in the 60s. However things were vastly different then. For one, the majority of women didn't work thus meaning that there wasn't a high proportion of childcare settings that there is now. The under 5s were already at home or being cared for by relatives, whereas now a large proportion of under 5s are in nurseries/with childminders, which would also be closed if schools were closed.

So while the closure of schools themselves may be able to halt the spread, the way in which people now live means that it is simply not possible to just close schools and nurseries, and childminders, due to the impact on an already disasterous economy.

I'm very confused about SF, but my instincts is that the schools should have shut earlier. I don't know if going back later will help, unless they were shut all over the winter?

But really, children's health is more important than anything else at all, and we should all do what we can. Maybe we could split the childcare (ie, looking after kids at home) with partners? Offices could have skeleton-staff rotas. I'm sure Britain could cope if we all rallied.

Maybe you could cancel your summer holidays to save up leave for a possible school closure?

There's a shedload of whining on this thread.

and who is going to look after the kids if you cancel your summer holiday? More to the point, if you have a booked summer holiday are you supposed to just write off the £££ you've spent on it? A lot of people just can't afford to do that.

It's not wining - it's reality. There's talk of the schools closing till November, not just a couple of weeks but two months. Most people simply don't have that amount of holiday, and companies can't be expected to pay staff to be off work for an indefinite amount of time.

if schools here were to close we would be ok work-wise as I am sahm so dh would just go to work as usual. But what of those people who both work? People really do seem to be losing sight of the fact that for most, taking two months unpaid holiday to look after their children is simply not possible. Not everyone has savings. Some people are already living on the breadline. What are they supposed to do?

I think politicians sometimes forget not that most people live on wages far lower than their own, but what that actually means. Like not being able to survive for two months unpaid or being threatened with the sack.

If they think shutting the schools will help, fine, but they have to think about the consequences and provide some emergency help for parents. Because as people have said, we'll still need doctors, nurses, hospital secretaries, receptionists and porters, not to mention tanker drivers, supermarket lorry drivers, shelf-stackers, check out assistants, bin men... I could go on for ever.

i think the politician are against this because they know it will affect the economy, even if it does save lives. From what i know, the scientists are advising it as an option and the politicians are against it because of the economical cost.

I truly do not think shutting all schools will happen, tbh

totally unworkable, IMO

ds's school would probably shut even if there's no national directive. They were the MOST reluctant to open when we had a couple of inches of snow in February - other local schools at least tried. And my milklady made it every day, while the headteacher was telling us the roads were impassable...

There are lots of things we could do right now to save lives.

You could ban all private cars overnight, that would save a tremendous amount of lives every day - far more than have died worldwide of this flu. But it would be ridiculous and unworkable.

Yes, I know that's an extreme example, but the point is that you have to weigh up the risks and the consequences. At this point in time, the risks of this flu just aren't high enough to justify closing all the schools for two months, imo.

Now if we had a 1918-style pandemic with the loss of life that was seen there, then I would happily let normal life shut down for as long as considered necessary without "whining". We are not in that situation now.

(For comparison - from the figures I could find, mortality rate for 1918 flu was 10-20% of everyone infected. Normal flu is about 0.2-0.4% according to who you read, I think? Struggling to find actual rates for swine flu rather than just predicted rates, but again looking around the 0.2-0.4% mark)

Look, if this is considered it is not something decided on a whim. And definitely not a conspiracy (what nonsense). You can see for yourself by looking at the evidence discussed at length by emergency planners, epidemiologists, economists, lawyers, ethicists in academic and press journals around the world, ever since the H5N1 threat was identified.

Here are but a few of the positions, found during a 30 second search on a bibliographic database:

Author(s): Cauchemez S (Cauchemez, Simon)1, Valleron AJ (Valleron, Alain-Jacques)2,3,4, Boelle PY (Boelle, Pierre-Yves)2,3,4, Flahault A (Flahault, Antoine)2,3,5, Ferguson NM (Ferguson, Neil M.)1
Source: NATURE Volume: 452 Issue: 7188 Pages: 750-U6 Published: APR 10 2008
Times Cited: 11 References: 22 Citation Map
Abstract: The threat posed by the highly pathogenic H5N1 influenza virus requires public health authorities to prepare for a human pandemic. Although pre-pandemic vaccines and antiviral drugs might significantly reduce illness rates(1,2), their stockpiling is too expensive to be practical for many countries. Consequently, alternative control strategies, based on non-pharmaceutical interventions, are a potentially attractive policy option. School closure is the measure most often considered. The high social and economic costs of closing schools for months make it an expensive and therefore controversial policy, and the current absence of quantitative data on the role of schools during influenza epidemics means there is little consensus on the probable effectiveness of school closure in reducing the impact of a pandemic. Here, from the joint analysis of surveillance data and holiday timing in France, we quantify the role of schools in influenza epidemics and predict the effect of school closure during a pandemic. We show that holidays lead to a 20 - 29% reduction in the rate at which influenza is transmitted to children, but that they have no detectable effect on the contact patterns of adults. Holidays prevent 16 - 18% of seasonal influenza cases (18 - 21% in children). By extrapolation, we find that prolonged school closure during a pandemic might reduce the cumulative number of cases by 13 - 17% (18 - 23% in children) and peak attack rates by up to 39 - 45% (47 - 52% in children). The impact of school closure would be reduced if it proved difficult to maintain low contact rates among children for a prolonged period.

Effects of school closures, 2008 winter influenza season, Hong Kong

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Author(s): Cowling BJ (Cowling, Benjamin J.)1, Lau EHY (Lau, Eric H. Y.), Lam CLH (Lam, Conrad L. H.), Cheng CKY (Cheng, Calvin K. Y.), Kovar J (Kovar, Jana)2, Chan KH (Chan, Kwok Hung), Peiris JSM (Peiris, J. S. Malik), Leung GM (Leung, Gabriel M.)
Source: EMERGING INFECTIOUS DISEASES Volume: 14 Issue: 10 Pages: 1660-1662 Published: OCT 2008
Times Cited: 4 References: 15 Citation Map
Abstract: In winter 2008, kindergartens and primary schools in Hong Kong were closed for 2 weeks after media coverage indicated that 3 children had died, apparently from influenza. We examined prospective influenza surveillance data before, during, and after the closure. We did not find a substantial effect on community transmission.

Nonpharmaceutical interventions implemented by US cities during the 1918-1919 influenza pandemic
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Author(s): Markel H (Markel, Howard), Lipman HB (Lipman, Harvey B.), Navarro JA (Navarro, J. Alexander), Sloan A (Sloan, Alexandra), Michalsen JR (Michalsen, Joseph R.), Stern AM (Stern, Alexandra Minna), Cetron MS (Cetron, Martin S.)
Source: JAMA-JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION Volume: 298 Issue: 6 Pages: 644-654 Published: AUG 8 2007
Times Cited: 37 References: 41 Citation Map
Abstract: Context A critical question in pandemic influenza planning is the role nonpharmaceutical interventions might play in delaying the temporal effects of a pandemic, reducing the overall and peak attack rate, and reducing the number of cumulative deaths. Such measures could potentially provide valuable time for pandemic-strain vaccine and antiviral medication production and distribution. Optimally, appropriate implementation of nonpharmaceutical interventions would decrease the burden on health care services and critical infrastructure.
Objectives To examine the implementation of nonpharmaceutical interventions for epidemic mitigation in 43 cities in the continental United States from September 8, 1918, through February 22, 1919, and to determine whether city-to-city variation in mortality was associated with the timing, duration, and combination of nonpharmaceutical interventions; altered population susceptibility associated with prior pandemic waves; age and sex distribution; and population size and density.

Design and Setting Historical archival research, and statistical and epidemiological analyses. Nonpharmaceutical interventions were grouped into 3 major categories: school closure; cancellation of public gatherings; and isolation and quarantine.

Main Outcome Measures Weekly excess death rate (EDR); time from the activation of nonpharmaceutical interventions to the first peak EDR; the first peak weekly EDR; and cumulative EDR during the entire 24-week study period.

Results There were 115 340 excess pneumonia and influenza deaths ( EDR, 500/ 100 000 population) in the 43 cities during the 24 weeks analyzed. Every city adopted at least 1 of the 3 major categories of nonpharmaceutical interventions. School closure and public gathering bans activated concurrently represented the most common combination implemented in 34 cities (79%); this combination had a median duration of 4 weeks ( range, 1-10 weeks) and was significantly associated with reductions in weekly EDR. The cities that implemented nonpharmaceutical interventions earlier had greater delays in reaching peak mortality ( Spearman r=- 0.74, P

Should add that most of these studies were anticipating H5N1 being the problem (which it still could be). But equally H1N1 could be the problem.

We just don't know. In the circs, what is better, do nothing? Based on what evidence and belief? Show it to me, and if I'm persuaded, I'll agree with you. Until then, if a consensus emerges amongst experts, I'll listen to them.

There is no consensus yet by the way: all of this is conjecture.

I thought closing schools would be done at the same time as telling pg woman to stay at home - when we get to 1 in 3 with it, and that many people being off work ill would mean the economy grinding to a halt for a few weeks anyway...

Thanks vulpus.

Edam,

to draw conclusions as to what the next conservative government will do by what the last one did is irrational, that's like saying this Labour government will bankrupt the country... oh wait