I'm struggling with the idea that the current disruption of education could continue indefinitely, to be honest. I agree that children shouldn't be vaccinated at the moment (apart from in certain circumstances where the benefit to that child - or possibly their family - outweighs the risk). But if that means that the current cycle of testing, isolation of close contacts, and associated severe limits on activities in schools and extra-curriculars to protect bubbles and so on continues, I'm no longer so sure.
In an ideal world (albeit an ideal world with covid) with all over 18s fully vaccinated with whatever boosters or variations are needed to target particular variants, I think we just have to assume that children will catch covid and so develop some immunity. Unfortunately, some will have a much heavier burden in terms of the severity of the disease and recovery from it than others. But in that case I do think that the emphasis should be on helping those few (with additional resources), rather than limiting the lives and education of everyone else. Of course, things may change over time - vaccines may improve to reduce risk to children, or the disease may worsen in children, so altering the vaccine risk/ benefit - so it's always possible to change the process. But knowing what we do at the moment about the disease in children, and having our current vaccine toolkit, it doesn't seem proportionate to mass-vaccinate children, to me. Especially if the choice is UK kids or older people in other countries... though I'm not convinced that's an either/or sum in the medium to long term.
I'm not even sure if the current vaccines mean that people can't develop long covid anyway, if that is what we want children to avoid? I know they reduce transmission, and so reduce the number of people being infected - and of those infected the risk of severe disease is pretty negligible. But I think there is still a risk of mild disease, and as a result long covid, which doesn't seem to tie itself to "worse" cases, from what I've read?
I imagine over time, there will be public health recommendations that anyone diagnosed with covid stays at home for a period (as per chicken pox, for example) and anyone with a cough or cold symptoms takes extra precautions - such as mask wearing, not visiting hospitals etc unnecessarily and so on - as per flu/ norovirus at the moment. But when Chris Whitty and whatsisface talk about "living with covid" I take that to mean very much more "2019 normal with extra guidance" than mandated quarantine, perma-masks, walls of perspex or cellophane if you are even allowed to see people face to face, and reduced capacity everywhere in perpetuity. I know we get used to stuff, but that kind of life seems several giant leaps too far. I admit as a misanthrope I'm quite enjoying slightly less cramped cafes and table service. Not enough to want it to threaten the livelihoods of those places though...