Covid-19 Virus

I would agree. This for me is the most significant development so far. If the government / health authority cant take us out of Covid through contact tracing they should be shot.

 

Circumstantial evidence that Covid-19 could have been circulating Wuhan as early as last summer/early autumn last year.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-52975934

 

I was reading that last night, seems a bit tenuous to me really.

 

Off the back of the national decision not to open schools any further, it appears there’s loads of councils and schools still refusing to open to even the first phase of children.

Twitter is full of examples of north west councils pushing back the reopening for Reception, Yr1 and Yr6 children another week because of ‘recent press reports about the increased R number in the north west’. It’s bonkers. One study out of several modelled the north west R rate could be just above 1. Other studies disagreed and said it was below 1. And all agreed the R number is a couple of weeks out of date, is volatile when cases drop to such low numbers and so can fluctuate wildly in these circumstances. One council that used that excuse to stay closed has had 2 confirmed cases of Covid in its area - not deaths, just cases - since 31 May. Yet the harm caused to children by not being in schools seems to not enter the equation.

Our daughter’s school reopened yesterday but ludicrously wrote an urgent letter to parents on Sunday morning citing a three day old local newspaper article about our area being a hotspot and the headteacher said on that basis she was imploring parents not to send their kids.

Since when was education policy set by press reports and local papers?

 

My kids school, 400 pupils has currently about 40 attending and I suspect that's it. I know mine, year 3 and 5, will not be back until September at the earliest. Is there a reason for the choice of years? I would have thought Year 6 would have been the most important

 

The problem has been that the return has not been evidence based or rational. A rational approach would have been to cut our losses like Scotland has and even start the Summer Holidays, bringing kids back two weeks early in late August. But no, we did things before the numbers had dropped sufficiently. We then end up with this, a school in Milton Keynes closing at the end of last week because 9 children and 3 adults started showing symptoms. They may not have Covid at all, but confidence (nor testing) isn't there. It would be there if we were nearer Denmark, Italy or New Zealand's levels.

The argument about the damage to children is moot besides doing this correctly, because doing it wrong fails and then the damage continues for longer.

 

I don’t think there’s a long term argument for only Reception and Year 1 attending over others but in the short term I believe it’s to do with the amount of attention they need while at home. In essence, a parent is less likely to be able to work from home with a 5 year old in tow than a 7 year old, who would be more self-sufficient in theory.

While our daughter is going now, our school has ‘helpfully’ told the parents who opted out of sending their kids from this week that they’ve missed the boat and need to join a waiting list now. So even if their confidence builds and they feel able to take the step of sending their child having heard and seen it’s safe from other parents, they can’t. The whole approach has been completely counter-productive and will do nothing to build confidence for September.

 

September is three months away. Three months ago we were barely into the crisis. Covid could be way down the list on the Country's worries by September if cases dry up in the hot summer. If the vaccine is ready like my AZ acquaintance believes, we may even be entering the final phase.

What is to be feared is (without vaccine) we allow the virus to creep back up and live through a slow motion version of this Spring. But we should be optimistic.

 

Who’s to say number hasn’t ‘dropped sufficiently’? This is exactly my point. Teachers, their representatives and some local councils have basically been casting around for any evidence they can get their hands on to support a blanket closure. No matter how detached it is from the reality in their locality, no matter the source. As we all know, you can draw a 2 mile circle around most primary schools on a map and probably end up finding the houses of 99% of their pupils. Primary schools are inherently part of local communities. I’d say misusing a regional number in the way the north west councils I mentioned have actually damages the cause of reopening whether you think it should happen now or in September - it misleads people, worries them and increases uncertainty. It definitely prevents any optimism breaking out!

Your point about Milton Keynes isn’t a sign of an unmitigated negative or failure either. I presume a school in any of the countries you name would have to close too if someone got Covid symptoms? Plus it’s opening again tomorrow as far as I can tell.

 

Yep, one single report had the R in the northwest at 1.01. Every other, of which there are many, had everywhere below 1. This is against the backdrop of cases progressively dropping nationally with regional changes in the R becoming less of an issue.

A similar thing happened in Brighton (granted, a smaller area) a few weeks back after the hysteria around people packing into the beach there. Lots of stories that the R could be as high as 1.7... aghhh, panic. The reality was their case numbers are so low, weekly it had gone something like 7,2,5, pushing it to 1.7, before it dropped again.

 

So far apparently no uptick in cases of Covid in any of the beach hotspots. We’re 2 weeks down the line now so if it doesn’t come soon it ain’t happening.

 

In the end it doesn’t matter. The opening of schools was a tad too early and damaged confidence in the process.

We don’t have uniquely feckless teachers, anxious parents or safety conscious councillors. The rest of the World has faced the same problems and we should have followed the examples we had.

 

Just to be clear, I’m not really on the wider opening hobby horse here. That’s been done in the politics section so I didn’t want to bring those arguments out here.

I’m talking about the year groups who should already be in school and the blockers and pathetic excuses being made to prevent even that limited attempt to get schooling up and running again. It’s fine saying ‘well confidence in the government is low’ or the like, but it seems to me it’s a vicious circle.

Here’s a real example. Sefton Council letter dated yesterday.




So they were already opening two weeks later than the government asked them to and now they’ve paused for another week because of ‘significant publicity over the weekend’ about the R number thing. The letter also admits they can’t even accurately say what the R number is locally. And stats show there were 2 cases of Covid diagnosed a day in Sefton Council’s area up until 4 June and none since then. Hardly indicative of exponential spread, even if we concede there’s no doubt unidentified cases about too.

Leaving aside the question of why The Rock is dabbling in Merseyside local government, do you not think that’s a completely risk adverse position they’ve taken? And that maybe some leadership - which is what they’re paid to do - is what is needed right now rather than crippling indecision the likes of this? What will realistically change in a week?

 

You’re completely correct. But public opinion is against it, so politicians will jump on the bandwagon, even if they realise that the car journey to school is probably more dangerous for the kid than potentially catching Covid.

 

Business owners and staff desperate to get back to work to save their businesses and jobs.

School teachers and staff, state funded, no risk to jobs, looking for any excuse to continue the relaxed extended summer holidays and push all responsibility for children's education and wellbeing back to the parents, using any articles they can find to support that stance "for the safety of the children". Their extended break funded by a dwindling tax take.

 

Absolutely. Although even with general public opinion apparently set against it, in this case the children supposed to be attending were only those whose parents were content for them to do so and who were in the selected year groups. No one is being forced to send a child back - the government has been at pains to make clear it's up to parents, no one will be fined or punished for not doing so and home schooling would continue to be supported.

The message this gives is that even if you know what's best for your child, and you've spent time reading around to work out the real risk to them, you and your family from Covid like any good parent should, and you're only following government advice, and you've overcome the bullying peer pressure in the mummy social media groups not to send your child back, you still won't be allowed to because of one isolated (and dubious) piece of data. It's truly a farce. I think it's also a very British farce too.

Anyway, we're fortunate our daughter's school didn't cave - probably because we're not in the north west - but it's sad to see others did.

 

I can’t see any reason why local authorities shouldn’t respond to the local situation. That’s their role. Sefton has very particular circumstances which are evident when you visit and from all its outcome statistics.

It’s unfortunate there is so much ground between the risk averse and the risk deniers. You cannot really be surprised that people are taking a risk averse position after such a national disaster as this. It needs people to work together and produce a coherent plan.

My own view remains that virtual elimination with track and trace in place is the only way to successfully emerge and stay there. I appreciate you say you are not banging a drum, but suggestions of ‘blockers’ and ‘pathetic excuses’ says otherwise. We are nearly there, patience and understanding are needed.

 

The issue with patience and understanding are that some kids are struggling to escape abusive homes, get regular hot meals and the educational gap between rich and poor is growing.

I also think the mental and physical health impacts on being trapped inside away from friends will also have a disproportionately larger impact on a child's development than Covid.

 

Not to mention their parents potentially not being able to return to work either and the knock on effect that has on the whole family.

 

All the more urgency in getting their children back into school then.

 

I think the wider problem that drives lack of public confidence, not just with the schools issue, is that there seems to be no definitive knowledge about which categories of people with the virus (e.g. asymptomatic) can spread it or to what extent having the virus conveys immunity. I would have thought there is enough data around the world now to know the answers to these questions, but maybe not. Until they know them many are bound to err on the side of caution.

 

No, all the more reason to get it right.

 

I am finding it difficult with my 7 year old as the amount set from school isn't adequate, I have to work in the day time and it's difficult to focus on a 7 year old and my work, my wife can't work from home. By now I would have thought that schools should be pushed into giving daily lessons from their teachers on line for at least half the day. Some schools may well be doing that, I wouldn't know.

My 14 year old isn't so bad as his Watford Grammar teachers have all been setting an adequate amount to keep him busy all day for 5 days a week.

 

Yeah, I think that's a fair take on things. Though none of this is helped by the media, which screeches out headlines with confusing contradictions one day after the other. I don't think the public as a whole know (or will even agree at this stage) what we should be measuring to work out when it's ok to do some things again. The government's incoherence on this hasn't shed any light on it either.

Look at how things shifted so we've all become obsessed with R numbers in the last 3 to 4 weeks. Only for it now to turn out to be much more nuanced and problematic than I assume the government's communications folks thought when they teed up those slides for Boris to present on that fateful Sunday evening.

My worry is people are applying caution to Covid in way which they wouldn't for any other risk. I'd love to see a study - and I fully expect these will happen in years to come - to find out what exactly people are afraid/cautious of. Is it death? Is it being hospitalised? Is it inadvertently killing granny? Is it Kawasaki syndrome for the kiddies? The end of human civilisation? Is it they're not particularly afraid but lockdown suits them very nicely? Some of the those are glib but logic and anecdotal evidence suggests they're genuine.

 

Has the word ‘stress’ written all over it.

 

Mysteriously though the number of deaths in freak yachting accidents in West Belfast has rocketed in recent days.

 

Yes, I definitely think there must be some kind of mix like that. My general fear has always been that too many people would be stupid enough to ignore the rules and cause a 'second spike' which would cause much more damage to the vulnerable and the economy. But my personal fear is one of the unknown. I'm intelligent enough to appreciate the level of risk but the effect of the virus on people of similar ages is highly variable. I have slight 'underlying conditions' so if I became infected would I shake it off as most seem to, or would I be one of the unlucky few who spend weeks in intensive care? I don't class myself as 'afraid', but certainly 'cautious'.

 

So we’ve seen cases drop weekly from 1/400, to 1/1000 last week, and now down to 1/1600.

Turns out it was fine to go to the beach.

https://twitter.com/ons/status/1271359853936680960?s=21

 

Hopefully the same will be true of mass protests! I guess we will find out soon enough.

 

Looks like the R rate has had its time in a limelight and is about to be ditched.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk

 

I thought R was all important though. Even if infection is small, if R is greater than 1 then don't we exponentially end up back in the dung?