Public Health dictate the symptom list, not Dept of Ed.
I see where you’re coming from, it’s headwrecking for parents to have to deal with this. But realistically, I think this is Public Health’s version of ‘personal accountability’ when it comes to primary schools. They know there’s in-school transmission and that the mitigations they’ve outlined are largely unworkable in schools. For example, one of the guidelines is that if a school finds that ventilation is not adequate the ‘school architect’ should be called on to fix it. I don’t know any school in the country with a dedicated architect or the money to employ one.
PH seem to have decided that there is enough leeway in the testing system to deal with symptomatic kids. We’ve already seen over the past few weeks that the system can’t cope with testing and tracing close contacts. So their way of dealing with this is to only test those with symptoms, leave close contacts in school and provide a symptom list that includes everything but the kitchen sink in the hope that enough parents will take on the burden of bringing kids for tests. And all those kids will be put down as community transmission.
And indeed if you have more than one child you’re snookered, because any time any one of them has a single symptom they’ve all to stay off until the one with the runny nose is tested?
I don’t know how we can demedicalise our existence at this point when the DES has updated the symptoms- snotty / stuffy noses and diarrhoea and vomiting etc. Is keeping and unwell child home enough, or as per your post should every child with any symptom at all be tested before the return to school even if perfectly well?
Thank goodness!
They should but i would bet my life they will not in our school at least.
The requirement for children who are deemed to be close contacts of a confirmed Covid-19 case to be tested and to restrict their movements may cease at the end of this month. NPHET agreed today that this change could be implemented if no significant in-school transmission is seen in the meantime.
It also agreed that masks should not be required for children under 13 years of age, following advice from HIQA.
All 5 were beside each other. Primary kids are not vaccinated. We have no idea of the long term implications of infection, even mild infection, on them.
Unless all 5 monitors were in the same place and orientation in the room you would expect them to have different readings.
Also, you are vaccinated. The changes of having a serious infection are massively reduced
I teach 5th class. Here is an example of a week in school.
Two kids were out on Monday as they were close contacts. Such is the stigma that the Dept of Ed and Public Health have created around Covid in schools, both were very uncomfortable about explaining their absence to other kids. An absence which should be completely normalised by now. I knew because their parents had contacted the school.
Another kid was in Monday and out Tuesday and Wednesday. Said he had a sore throat and stomach upset. Back in school today, no note from home.
His friend, who was on a play date with him last weekend, was out all week until today. Also said he had sore throat. No note from home.
Neither kid was tested, I didn’t ask them, the other kids did. So there’s absolutely no way for me or the classroom SNA to know whether they just have regular back to school sniffles or if it’s more serious. There were 2 other kids from the class on the same play date.
I’m vaccinated but got swine flu in school in 20009 and suffered from serious post-viral issues for 5 years afterwards. Really, really do not want Covid, or more particularly long Covid, as many of its symptoms mimic what I went through. I also have elderly parents, vaccinated, but vulnerable all the same.
I, like every other teacher I know, want schools open and functioning. Kids missed out on too much socially, there is evidence of it in the classroom. I just wonder how we can do this safely. Public Health are understaffed and the people at the top seem to have no comprehension of how small Irish classrooms are and how many kids are squashed into them. Dept of Ed will do literally anything to maintain the party line of ‘Schools are safe’. Anywhere is safe if you suppress the number of cases coming from it. At the moment we have all windows and doors open but that can’t continue into the winter. We got 5 CO2 monitors, there are 18 classrooms and 8 resource rooms in the school. So far, their readings are unreliable - all 5 in the same room produced different readings.
I do believe that we need to learn to live with Covid and begin to de-medicalise our existence at this point. However, I’m not convinced that kids and staff in primary schools are being adequately protected so that this can happen successfully.
I’m really against mask wearing for young kids. Totally against it.
Typical US "Go big or go home" stuff.
The devil's in the detail. The mandate only requires that it should be worn by anyone capable of doing so. I can tell you that you'd have a lot of fun trying to keep a child under 4 wearing a mask for more than five minutes.
This is typical though, U.S. laws tend to lack subtlety.
Yep, afraid so. If the child being tested gets the all clear, the others can return to school. The tested child needs to wait 48 hours from symptoms fading.
If one of the kids has a cough (booked in for a test) should the other (no symptoms) stay home from school? Struggling to find the exact guidelines.
That's ridiculous, improper mask wearing will lead to the spread of covid, it can be difficult to understand adults speech wearing masks, not a mind children.
New York gov just brought in mask mandate from the age of two up.
NPHET meeting today but probably no change in advice on the level of testing just yet. Masks on younger kids also up for discussion.
Well, in our school the teachers are planning to take the kids out of the room if possible, while leaving windows and doors open.
Even a 5 minute walk around the yard would be enough to reduce the levels, once a decent airflow is established. It's obviously messy and will be difficult to implement (what if there are already kids moving in the corridors, what if more than one class triggers a warning at the same time) but where possible it'll be a mitigation factor, every little bit helps.
I wish the Department would invest in hepa filters for every room, it's actually a pretty reasonable investment considering the cost of not doing it. Our PTA is looking into just fundraising for them instead.
Obviously those rooms should get priority, well ventilated rooms don't need them at all,it will end up like the ventilators, alot of these will never be taken out of the box
I Wonder will they be fitted in the classrooms that have no windows?
This 46 year old politician? The anti-vaxxer DUP councillor? Unfortunately there's no cure for stupid.
We leave all the windows open all the time (in current weather anyway) so I'm failing to see their purpose to be honest.
The classrooms? Good bit of variety I suppose given that the oldest part of our school building dates back to the 1950s and the "new extension" is 20 years old with two other extensions in between. Then we also have prefabs. Older rooms tend to have smaller floor space but higher ceilings.
Different purpose classrooms add to the variety. General classrooms hold between 20 and 24 students spaced 1m apart (where possible) .Practical classrooms such as the metal work room is huge compared to the general classrooms in the old block. Resource classrooms are basically repurposed offices/storage cupboards so they're small. We also have 4 classrooms that have no opening windows that hold approx 24 students.
considering all they amount to is "oh its red, open the windows more and hope it gets better" i cant really see the point in them either
how different are they all?
50% of adults in hospital are vaccinated because over 90% of all adults are fully vaccinated ergo they make up the vast majority of the population. The fact 50% comes from unvaccinated people, when they make up a complete minority of the population now, says everything and that's what your focus should be. Sadly the media confused people like yourself with the stance they took with these figures the other day and their choices of headline.
Our monitors arrived today. We got 8. We have over 50 classrooms. Apparently more will come. Not sure if there's much point to them.
Why the need to send home and entire class, how can the whole class be considered a close contact. What if they come back and then there is one more case? Are the school going to send all students home again?
Realistically we cant get into a situation where every time there is a positive case the whole class is sent home. There have been 2 years of interrupted education. Isn't this the reason there are pods? To reduce the close contacts.
Are people actually for real? Let is rip through primary school? What so they can bring it home to vulnerable adults? Do people realise that a recent analysis of hospitalisation showed that 50% of adults in hospitial were fully vaccinated?
46 year old politician has died up the North from Covid 19 and people on here dismissing it as a common cold.
That's a very good question, technically they're denying the children access to education for the 10 days without proof they are a legitimate risk (positive test etc), I totally understand why but can they actually do that considering it's a constitutional right?
The school is following the HSE advice. Can you imagine what the teacher unions would say if a school said it would not follow public health advice??
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