How's track and trace working these days?

[Rae36]

Track and trace, test and trace, test and protect, not a clue what it's actually called.

We've had bloody loads of potential self-isolation contacts in the past week or so. Loads at school (3 kids, 3 schools unfortunately) that the school seem to deal with quite well and efficiently.

Two of my kids at a youth group where we knew through the school that a kid there had tested positive but no-one officially told the youth club. They only found out by chance then had to scrabble around contacting everyone days after the event. They're not all at the same school so they wouldn't have caught everyone that way.

One ds at rugby training was told he wasn't a close contact of a positive case because they were outside.
One is now isolating after a positive case at outdoor football training, but there was a fair bit of confusion around whether he would have to or not, I think the club struggled to get the right info. We've never been contacted by anyone official from the NHS, just a WhatsApp from the club captain.

And a few other random potential contacts, luckily we've ended up with just one actually isolating.

But it all seems a bit disjointed now. Is there still a bank of people phoning up the positive cases, finding out where they've been and contacting the relevant people? Or are there just so many cases that we're relying on everyone in the chain doing the right thing and telling the right people?

It's called test and protect.

And yes there are banks of contact tracers speaking to positive cases to determine where they've been

Sounds like a mishmash right enough

We got contacted by track and trace at 4pm one day, our dc was to isolate till midnight
45 minute activity, outside was the event that triggered it.
It’s all having a huge impact on families at the moment. And don’t start me on the email that tells you contact tracing is ongoing but doesn’t clarify if everyone has been contacted or not. Dreadful for anxiety!

You only need to isolate if test and Protect instruct you to. Usually its via text or email and they sometimes follow up with a phone call to go over the isolation instructions.

You don't need to isolate on hearing that that someone at football training or youth club tested positive. Test and Protect would speak to the positive person and then officially contact all of their close contacts.

Also you are only classed as a close contact if you spent more than 15minutes closer than 2 meters to the positive person.

Had three emails from school yesterday (one for each child, I'm assuming) saying that they were doing contact tracing and would be in touch if we were affected.

They weren't in touch.

I've deleted the app and so they can't ping me with that, and not really going places where they ask me to check in. We've already decided that if one of us gets pinged, we're not totally isolating from everyone else in the house either.

My dd has been sent home to isolate today, and because of the high number of cases locally they are now saying siblings have to isolate too,so younger sibling had to come home too. No contact at all from test and protect or whoever they are. It's been extremely vague, DH and i don't know if we can go to work or not

You don't need to isolate on hearing that that someone at football training or youth club tested positive. Test and Protect would speak to the positive person and then officially contact all of their close contacts

The coach said he'd been in touch with Test and Protect and he was responsible for contacting us all. We've not been contacted by anyone official. Is that not right?
We've had no official advice at all, just what we looked up gor ourselves on the internet

Usually you will get a follow-up official text or email from test and Protect saying you've been a close contact and with the isolation instructions.

My dc have had a number of isolations and everytime we've had something sent from test and Protect. Soemtimes the school have sent them home to isolate but it's always been followed up with official contact with NHS either the same day or the next day.

The letter you get from test and Protect has your isolation end date too as sometimes it's not the full 10 days depending on when the person was tested/developed symptoms. Also they ask for all close contacts to get a PCR test before returning to school and it has instructions for how to access this and when it should be done.

Obviously you might want to Isolate anyway if you think you've been in contact with ampsitive case to be extra safe. But I'd assume if you don't have the letter from test and Protect you are not classed as close contact.

The rules for close contacts are stricter than you might think, it's not just a case of being in the same cafe at same time, it's about time spent, proximity and PPE and distancing measures, it's all taken into account. With the exception of schools where it seems whole classes are still being asked to isolate.

Secondary schools whole classes are not being asked to isolate. Maybe due to time spent being a factor.

My dc have had a number of isolations and everytime we've had something sent from test and Protect

We've had letters from school obviously written in conjunction with NHS, we've had nothing from football or the time someone had to isolate after youth group. In both those cases we were told the leader had been in touch with NHS and that was it.

@Invisimamma I'm not doubting you for a second, you sound like the most knowledgeable person I've spoken to about this so far. I am so confused. I can't see how running around a football pitch outdoors is close and sustained contact.
We'll stay at home now to be on the safe side.

I wonder if the youth groups and football are being extra cautious or have got wired crossed somewhere about advice.

It's just a shame for kids having to miss out on so much when they don't need to. We have a holiday booked for end of term and I'm dreading getting a text asking dc to isolate and having to cancel.

I would say unless you get official notification, then it's not required.
I have insurance and it will cover us if we're contacted to isolate, but they require the confirmation for that which would be pretty standard.

I can see that the football team wants to be seen to be taking measures, but surely it's down to the proper channels to agree what counts as contact when people are being expected to give up their lives for 10 days.

From speaking to our nursery it seems that track and trace work directly with the club/school/nursery who themselves define who was in close contact within the guidelines they are given. Some can’t categorically say one way or another (nurseries mainly) how close kids were so they tend to isolate everyone. In some instances the activity itself may make it easier to define distance and timescales therefore only certain kids might get caught up in T&P.

The letters are produced by the school/nursery but some don’t bother and just verbally inform/text. Sounds like the education powers that be are challenging government in it though due to missed education concerns. Nicola alluded to changes in the next term which hopefully allow for an alternative to 10 day isolation!!

Seems from further investigation that the football coach was told by NHS that it was his decision who counted as a close contact. He says he didn't get any help at all to make the decision, the person on the phone was completely non-committal when he asked specific questions and just kept repeating "well was it close and sustained contact". So he erred on the side of caution and is now worried everyone hates him because of it. The rugby coach last week obviously made a different call. Who's right, who's wrong, I have no idea. But it seems really unfair that volunteer coaches are having to make these decisions.
I hope there is a review of isolation requirements sooner rather than later.

That's a huge responsibility for the coaches @Rae36 . I thought the tracing service was costing a fortune- the least they could do is issue clear guidelines.
Also holiday insurance requires official documentation to cancel, so what happens there?

I work in this area. Test and protect expect schools to identify close contacts and ask them to self-isolate. T&P then follow up with a text or phone call (depending on volume of cases).

However, I think it may vary by health board area so it may be different elsewhere.

Also holiday insurance requires official documentation to cancel, so what happens there?

We still don't have any official documentation. I guess I'd have contacted the club first and then the NHS tracers, I honestly don't know. And if I couldn't get anything official we'd just go on our holiday. I don't know all that many people who have had to isolate out of school so I've no idea whether this is normal or not.
Luckily we had nowhere to be and he's not fussy about being in school this close to the end of term so it doesn't really matter.