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How will schools be able to go back in September?

shoppergal

Just wondering if anyone can give any insight into how schools could safely re-open in September?

Everyone I'm talking to is saying they won't be back until September but in my head I'm wondering how they'll re-open even in September? The virus will still be there with a vaccine still months away at that stage.

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ldy4mxonucwsq6

SusanC10 wrote: »

Thanks for that - I must have got mixed up with that!

Do the 4 visitors still need to socially distance inside the other household from the residents of that household?

Yes they still have to social distance and if you're going into someone who had to cocoon you need mask and gloves.

Flippyfloppy

CruelSummer wrote: »

This is the experience of multiple observations and studies, not just the one small study quoted by HIQA. Switzerland are relaxing even further, they're miles ahead of us and have similar figures to us, Denmark, Austria, Belgium also expanding out their school reopening. This is late May. Here we are still fully closed, and talking about September which is a full 3 months away.

Have a look at the average class sizes in other European countries. Belgiums is 17. Additionally the facilties and size of schools on the continent are to a higher standard to Ireland. It is obvious why these schools can open and ours cannot.

average_runner

Zahir Bitter Cellist wrote: »

Yes they still have to social distance and if you're going into someone who had to cocoon you need mask and gloves.

Gloves can spread germs alot quicker as people can't use them properly.
I Always avoid the gloves.

ldy4mxonucwsq6

average_runner wrote: »

Gloves can spread germs alot quicker as people can't use them properly.
I Always avoid the gloves.

I know I don't wear them myself at all as I'd much rather just wash or sanitise depending on where I am. Gloves add to the problem as far as I'm concerned.

The guidelines say to wear gloves, mask, social distance if going into the home of someone who's in the cocoon category.

I've been doing shopping since March for a couple of households that had to cocoon over the past few months, we just distanced no gloves or masks.

Boggles

average_runner wrote: »

Yep we opened up and our numbers kept under a 100, actually fell most days.

Seriously?

Any infections reported yesterday or before predates last Monday week.

Best leave it to the people that understand how the virus transmits to make the decisions.

brendanwalsh

No way schools will be able to open and function normally in September with PPE and social distancing. You’d need to reduce class sizes to 12 with 2 meter distancing and only allow one to two years in at a time.

The small rural country schools with 7 in a class may be the best primed to re open.

Inner city schools haven’t a hope

JDxtra

Happy to see kids playing outside in groups the last week or two. I don't think any reasonable person would have an issue with this. Kids need this. Parents need this.

Tony H. and the second wave doomsdayers need to see the overall picture in terms of health and wellbeing of children. Schools must reopen and the stupid unenforceable 2m rule needs to go. Until that happens, the dept. and schools will hide behind it.

Iscreamkone

Coronavirus is not in the community at present. They won't tell us that it is only in nursing homes and hospitals - and this is decreasing very quickly at present.

You would find it very hard to catch it if you tried at the moment. This may change but we will be very prepared for future spikes (if any).

By September there will be no need for 2m distancing anywhere. I wouldn't have a problem letting my children off to school now.

FishOnABike

iamwhoiam wrote: »

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/trinity-prof-luke-oneill-no-scientific-evidence-to-say-schools-can-not-reopen-1002180.html

I'm not sure if you're agreeing or disagreeing with spaceHopper but the examiner article in the link is pretty ambiguous.

Saying "there is no scientific evidence to say schools should not re-open" is not saying much and it isn't the same as saying schools should re-open.

I would hope decisions aren't influenced by third hand media reports.

There are large scale studies which indicate children have been shown to suffer the same attack rate¹ and have the same viral load² as adults.

¹ https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(20)30287-5/fulltext
² https://zoonosen.charite.de/fileadmin/user_upload/microsites/m_cc05/virologie-ccm/dateien_upload/Weitere_Dateien/analysis-of-SARS-CoV-2-viral-load-by-patient-age.pdf

The second of these cautions "The viral loads observed in the present study, combined with earlier findings of similar attack rate between children and adults, suggest that transmission potential in schools and kindergartens should be evaluated using the same assumptions of infectivity as for adults ... Based on the absence of any statistical evidence for a different viral load profile in children found in the present study, we have to caution against an unlimited re-opening of schools and kindergartens in the present situation, with a widely susceptible population and the necessity to keep transmission rates low via non-pharmaceutical interventions. Children may be as infectious as adults."

[Deleted User]

brendanwalsh wrote: »

No way schools will be able to open and function normally in September with PPE and social distancing. You’d need to reduce class sizes to 12 with 2 meter distancing and only allow one to two years in at a time.

The small rural country schools with 7 in a class may be the best primed to re open.

Inner city schools haven’t a hope

I don’t think that schools will reopen as normal in September, even with a 1m social distancing principle. I’m guessing some kind of blended teaching, splitting time between physical attendance and online. And that should fit in with more WFH flexibility for most parents (white collar workers at least)

I’m anticipating a conversation with my 3 year old niece in 4 or 5 years time when I explain that there used to be a day when kids went to the actual school building EVERY DAY!!!

average_runner

Boggles wrote: »

Seriously?

Any infections reported yesterday or before predates last Monday week.

Best leave it to the people that understand how the virus transmits to make the decisions.

Thats not true, my dad got tested on Tuesday and results were in today.
All good, Took my brother two days to his results also.

Results are coming through alot quicker now. If it was taking two weeks, heads would be rolling by now

average_runner

brendanwalsh wrote: »

No way schools will be able to open and function normally in September with PPE and social distancing. You’d need to reduce class sizes to 12 with 2 meter distancing and only allow one to two years in at a time.

The small rural country schools with 7 in a class may be the best primed to re open.

Inner city schools haven’t a hope

You do know life will have to go back to normal. Social distancing isn't going to stay forever. 2 meters is a joke also with other countries with better results than us working off 1 meter.

average_runner

iamwhoiam wrote: »

By September kids will be meeting up with cousins and friends anyway so social distancing will be only half hearted .

Sorry to let you know, this is happening already on a large scale

FishOnABike

average_runner wrote: »

Thats not true, my dad got tested on Tuesday and results were in today.
All good, Took my brother two days to his results also.

Results are coming through alot quicker now. If it was taking two weeks, heads would be rolling by now

But you also have to add in the lag from the time of someone coming into contact with an infectious case and them becoming symptomatic and/or developing a sufficient viral load to test positive themselves.

That's a week or possibly up to two weeks to add on to the three day test turnaround time. Taking that into account we're probably looking at 10 to 14 days for the effect of reduced restrictions to start to be seen.

average_runner

FishOnABike wrote: »

But you also have to add in the lag from the time of someone coming into contact with an infectious case and them becoming symptomatic and/or developing a sufficient viral load to test positive themselves.

That's a week or possibly up to two weeks to add on to the three day test turnaround time. Taking that into account we're probably looking at 10 to 14 days for the effect of reduced restrictions to start to be seen.

Europe has shown us the way to go. Now either Leo moves us on and if not he should step aside.

I do believe he did a great job but now starting to make a mess of it. My home county hasn't had a case in over 3 weeks.

beggars_bush

Iscreamkone wrote: »

Coronavirus is not in the community at present. They won't tell us that it is only in nursing homes and hospitals - and this is decreasing very quickly at present.

You would find it very hard to catch it if you tried at the moment. This may change but we will be very prepared for future spikes (if any).

By September there will be no need for 2m distancing anywhere. I wouldn't have a problem letting my children off to school now.

Not true
There are clusters in communities associated with meat plants and other factories.

Iscreamkone

beggars_bush wrote: »

Not true
There are clusters in communities associated with meat plants and other factories.

And this warrants the continued closure of the whole country??
Close these factories and isolate all involved. They'll be fine in 3 weeks to go again.

ldy4mxonucwsq6

FishOnABike wrote: »

But you also have to add in the lag from the time of someone coming into contact with an infectious case and them becoming symptomatic and/or developing a sufficient viral load to test positive themselves.

That's a week or possibly up to two weeks to add on to the three day test turnaround time. Taking that into account we're probably looking at 10 to 14 days for the effect of reduced restrictions to start to be seen.

We've been told that it's virtually non existent in the community any more, of course they cant come out and say the virus is gone because nobody can guarantee that but its as close as we'll get.

90%+ of our cases have made a full recovery, the chances of catching it right now are extremely low and even if you do the odds are that you'll be just fine.

Majority of people are over it now and continuing with their normal lives. People can be optimistic that this is as good as over now.

timmy_mallet

FishOnABike wrote: »

But you also have to add in the lag from the time of someone coming into contact with an infectious case and them becoming symptomatic and/or developing a sufficient viral load to test positive themselves.

That's a week or possibly up to two weeks to add on to the three day test turnaround time. Taking that into account we're probably looking at 10 to 14 days for the effect of reduced restrictions to start to be seen.

Remember also that 98% of the tests for COVID-19 in Ireland are NEGATIVE.

There will be nobody in school because they're displaying a temperature even though only 2% are likely to have coronavirus. It's going to be an utter farce.

If our governments health experts advice is to be followed, then schools should remain closed indefinitely.

timmy_mallet

Zahir Bitter Cellist wrote: »

We've been told that it's virtually non existent in the community any more, of course they cant come out and say the virus is gone because nobody can guarantee that but its as close as we'll get.

90%+ of our cases have made a full recovery, the chances of catching it right now are extremely low and even if you do the odds are that you'll be just fine.

Majority of people are over it now and continuing with their normal lives. People can be optimistic that this is as good as over now.

I agree. Others don't. And for me, there is no middle ground for schools. Either it's all in or all out.

average_runner

timmy_mallet wrote: »

I agree. Others don't. And for me, there is no middle ground for schools. Either it's all in or all out.

Has to be all in. There is no way home schooling can work properly when both parents are working from home.

Also not all parts of society will buy into it

ldy4mxonucwsq6

timmy_mallet wrote: »

I agree. Others don't. And for me, there is no middle ground for schools. Either it's all in or all out.

When you think about it, if all going to plan then a month from tomorrow we're going to be able to sit in a restaurant, go to playgrounds, travel 20km, start to visit people in hospital/residential care, all non essential retailers can open back up within guidelines.

Business as usual for a lot of people. They may even decide to merge some of the phases if things are looking good.

Everyone will be well back to normal by the time the summer holidays come to an end. Once the 2m social distancing is dropped then it will be very difficult for schools to justify remaining shuttered.

Benimar

Zahir Bitter Cellist wrote: »

When you think about it, if all going to plan then a month from tomorrow we're going to be able to sit in a restaurant, go to playgrounds, travel 20km, start to visit people in hospital/residential care, all non essential retailers can open back up within guidelines.

Business as usual for a lot of people. They may even decide to merge some of the phases if things are looking good.

Everyone will be well back to normal by the time the summer holidays come to an end. Once the 2m social distancing is dropped then it will be very difficult for schools to justify remaining shuttered.

Whatever about it being reduced to 1.5m, we are a long way away from Social Distancing being dropped.

average_runner

Benimar wrote: »

Whatever about it being reduced to 1.5m, we are a long way away from Social Distancing being dropped.

Officially yes, in the real world its gone in alot of places already

timmy_mallet

average_runner wrote: »

Has to be all in. There is no way home schooling can work properly when both parents are working from home.

Also not all parts of society will buy into it

There are big challenges though as well, kids on the Bus, Dart, Luas, will there be capacity for them, for eg.

If schools can go back from Sept., why can't offices? Risk minimisation maybe, but theoretically, if schools are ok, so should offices.

Benimar

average_runner wrote: »

Officially yes, in the real world its gone in alot of places already

There is a huge difference between people making that choice for themselves and schools going against the advice though.

ldy4mxonucwsq6

Benimar wrote: »

Whatever about it being reduced to 1.5m, we are a long way away from Social Distancing being dropped.

A look out my window or a short walk would lead me to believe that for a lot of people it's largely been dropped already.

The government know this but will be the last to officially say that people don't have to distance anymore.

JDxtra

average_runner wrote: »

Has to be all in. There is no way home schooling can work properly when both parents are working from home.

Also not all parts of society will buy into it

This is exactly true. For me, I can just about fumble through the next few weeks knowing that myself and my partner have holidays and unpaid leave over July/August so the pressure will be off. There is absolutely no way I'm doing home schooling from September and doing paid work at the same time - it simply is not happening.

Benimar

Zahir Bitter Cellist wrote: »

A look out my window or a short walk would lead me to believe that for a lot of people it's largely been dropped already.

The government know this but will be the last to officially say that people don't have to distance anymore.

If Social Distancing is in place in September (which I believe it will be) there is no chance of Schools ignoring it.

If individual people want to go against advice thats on them. Schools won't want to expose themselves to issues if there is a spike and they have ignored SD.

Conelan

Zahir Bitter Cellist wrote: »

When you think about it, if all going to plan then a month from tomorrow we're going to be able to sit in a restaurant, go to playgrounds, travel 20km, start to visit people in hospital/residential care, all non essential retailers can open back up within guidelines.

Business as usual for a lot of people. They may even decide to merge some of the phases if things are looking good.

Everyone will be well back to normal by the time the summer holidays come to an end. Once the 2m social distancing is dropped then it will be very difficult for schools to justify remaining shuttered.

Schools don't have to justify anything, they are instructed to remain closed until told otherwise. There is no school making a decision on their own and having to justify anything. You do understand that I guess.