Sick children in playgrounds/classes

[HJA87]

Went to a forest school class on Friday with my 2 and bar maybe one child, every single other child there was ill. I’m talking looking generally unwell, green snot down the nose, coughing and sneezing a lot. Overheard a conversation between two parents about how everyone’s been ill in their households the last week and they had to cancel meetings at work etc. Spent the whole time there on edge trying to keep my toddlers away from the obviously ill ones. Then at the end of the class heard a parent saying,” let’s go home, you’re not feeling well, are you.” Why do people do this and ruin it for everyone else? And please don’t say the usual “ if we never went out when I’ll we would never be out at all”. End of a cold or an absolutely unavoidable outing- I can understand but taking your child to a toddler group in the very infectious beginning phase when they’re sneezing all over everyone is just plain selfish. I’ve noticed this is worse in the UK than any other county I’ve been to. There seems to be a myth about building up immunity where actually, back to back infections have the opposite effect. Immunity builds up during the period of recovery which is why doctors recommend rest when unwell. Seeing clearly unwell toddlers, often in inappropriate clothing playing outdoors in the cold is just sad and isn’t doing them any good in terms of health whilst also
exposing everyone else there.

You say don't say it but really it is true for some families with children - if I never went out when someone in my house had a cold, I would be indoors from oct half term to easter!! That's not practical or even fair on a child to keep them indoors for half the year.

I apply the same rules that school do for my eldest and I do for work. If we are well enough to go to school or work then we are well enough for anywhere. My eldest is expected to be at school with a cold but not a fever or D&V. I am expected to be at work with the same.

If people just stayed home for every small thing, the groups that you want to go to wouldn't be able to run. They wouldn't be viable and would close down. Then you wouldn't have anywhere to go.

You also have absolutely not idea what stage each of those toddlers are at in the most infectious point. You are not their parent so no idea if they have been sick for a week before venturing out. or if what you are seeing is only a portion of how sick they were. Every child is different and reacts differently.

Perfect example is my DD this morning. Snotty, sneezing and coughing. She's had a cold for the last 3 weeks. We avoided activities the first weekend she was ill but now we are going about life as normal. You are most contiguous before you show symptoms until about 5 days post symptoms. Then it drops drastically.

I came on here to vent about sick kids everywhere we go and the responses sadly reconfirmed what I already know about attitude to sickness in this country (bar the few sensible PPs). Kids are up now so I will be ending my contributions to the thread.

The problem is, germs are everywhere!
You can't avoid them. Immunity needs to be built up hence all the inoculations for various illnesses.

Plus, there are numerous studies of children that live a very sheltered, almost germ free life that are more prone to allergies and asthma than those growing up with pets and spending a lot of time outdoors in the early years.

Obviously there is a balance to all of this, but not going to a toddler group because DC has a common cold is a bit extreme.

Children have on average 8-10 viruses a year while their immue system matures. If you have multiple children, who catch a virus a few days after siblings, it can feel like someone's always ill.

My older children are now thankfully past the earlier years, have had the chicken pox etc and so I've only got one young child (a covid era toddler so missed those couple of years of exposure to colds and coughs which didn't help at all) so it's only her that tends to come down with the viruses. The rest of us avoid them mostly now even if shes had one - because we all has a healthy level of exposure when we were younger so now have decent immune systems.

“The rest of us avoid them mostly now even if shes had one - because we all has a healthy level of exposure when we were younger so now have decent immune systems.”

I wish people would stop repeating this myth. Exposure to viruses doesn’t build your immune system. This is why there is a new flu jab every year for example. You’re confusing viruses with bacteria.

https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2022/is-the-hygiene-hypothesis-true

Not catching things is also not necessarily a sign of a strong immune system.

'According to a new LJI study, published recently in Cell Host & Microbe, adults have stable memory responses of CCC-fighting antibodies and T cells, presumably derived from multiple exposures to CCCs in childhood. Thanks to this immune cell army, CCC infections in adulthood tend to be infrequent and mild.'

From the la jolla institute of immunology.

Flu virus changes every year. Cold virus does as well, obviously. But over time, your body will remember some of them that touve had beforeand and therefore if you're exposed to those ones, you're more likely to avoid them or not suffer quite as much as you would first exposure. Chickenpox - not as many variants so once you've had them, you're much less likely to get it (unless you're my brother who has had it three times...) Of course we still get colds - i've not long got over one as have my kids. My husband avoided it completely.

I noticed (anecdectolly (sp?) of course) that for a year or two after covid, where we hadn't really mixed with people for two years, that we all had so many more coughs, colds and various other illnesses than pre covid and lockdowns. Lots of my family and friends said the same. Our bodies were being hit with all the newer variants of viruses. After a couple of years, we all seem back to normal...because our bodies have had those viruses and so now if/when we are exposed to them, the immune system memory kicks in and fights them better, making them more of a sniffle if we do end up poorly, rather than a full blown nasty cold.

“Presumably”-it’s a theory that’s being debunked.

“The thing about rhinoviruses is that after recovering, you’re not protected from the next infection. There is no real immune protection there. Most of us suffer from colds throughout our whole life. Like I said, bacterial exposure is what’s key to priming the immune response.
Also, we forget that a lot of kids die from the flu. Unlike COVID-19, where younger kids are not quite as susceptible to severe illness, that’s not true for flu. RSV, too, can be quite severe in young children and older adults.”

WHAT ABOUT THE IDEA THAT YOU NEED TO BE EXPOSED TO VIRUSES IN EARLY LIFE BECAUSE IF YOU GET THEM AS AN ADULT, YOU’LL GET MORE SEVERELY ILL? WE KNOW THAT’S TRUE FOR CHICKENPOX, FOR EXAMPLE. DO YOU HAVE ANY CONCERNS ABOUT THAT?
We should rely on vaccines for those exposures because we can never predict who is going to be susceptible to severe illness, even in early childhood. If we look back before vaccines, children under 4 often succumbed to infections. I don’t think we want to return to that time in history.
Let me just give you one example. There’s a virus called RSV, it’s a respiratory virus. Almost all infants are positive for it by the age of 2. But those who get severe disease are more likely to develop allergic disease and other problems. So this idea that we must become infected with a pathogenic virus to be healthy is not a good one.
Even rhinovirus, which is the common cold, most people recover fine. But there’s a lot of evidence that for somebody who is allergic, rhinovirus exposures make them much worse. In fact, most allergic or asthmatic kids suffer through the winter months when these viruses are more common.
AND THAT’S PARTICULARLY SALIENT BECAUSE THERE IS A LOT OF RHINOVIRUS AND ENTEROVIRUS CIRCULATING RIGHT NOW.
From my point of view, right now, avoiding flu and COVID-19 is a priority. Those are not going to help you develop a healthy immune response, and in fact, they can do a lot of damage to the lungs during that critical developmental time. Data [show] that children that have more infections in the first 6 months to a year of life go on to have more problems.

None of your business! This thread is not about OP’s school plans so why the actual fuck are you cross examining her?

The OP is judging parents for not isolating their children. I am pointing out that OPs solution for isolating her own DC is unrealistic without causing her child hardship.

But there is a big difference between knowingly actively choosing to spread a virus/germs and unknowingly spreading something if you have no symptoms. We all know germs spread sometimes without us knowing.

It’s selfish.

I’ve observed this a lot recently especially weirdly since the pandemic (you’d think the pandemic would’ve meant more awareness of viral transmission but no…). I’ve concluded that people just don’t want to stay in or cancel their plans (especially if it involves money that’s already been paid).

It’s not hardship for my kids to rest up at home when they’re full of a cold. It’s not exactly conducive to learning when you’re not 100%. Much better to rest and allow for proper recovery. I don’t care what is expected from school.

Exactly, there is enough going round without directly subjecting other kids to your kid’s bodily fluid and therefore almost guaranteeing it will spread.

Have you never met someone with allergies? I would have been ill for my entire childhood and adolescence by this measure. I had a runny nose every single day due to allergies.

I do not believe the school wrote “not a single sniffle” was to be present in school.

Of course they didn’t. Ridiculous thing to say.

I agree OP. I think some people have huge anxiety around FOMO (for themselves, not that they’ll be making others miss out).