Schools and Covid 19 (part 5) **Mod warnings in OP**

The contact tracing will continue in the sports and other activities outside schools, so the changes are if a kid is positive in school it be caught at one of the sports and everyone will hear about it

Same here, not being keeping lists for outdoor soccer for 3 weeks now.

I agree . I think people are entitled to know if they are a close contact . Every family is different and some have vulnerable siblings or grandparents etc

Yep, it's one thing to say close contacts in schools no longer have to stay at home if no symptoms but to actually not bother to follow up with contract tracing is disgraceful. Fair enough people can decide themselves on risk if adults all vaccinated + no High risk but none of us know a family's circumstances.

I mean schools + HSE send home letters informing parents of cases of head lice or mealses or mumps outbreak etc but all of a sudden Covid doesn't matter as a public health risk anymore.

My heart goes out to any parent with a vulnerable child in school with Cystic Fibrosis, recovering from cancer etc, they must be at their wits end.

Iamwhoiam, 100% agree, inform parents with the facts + then they can make best choice for their family.

This decision was not made though based on evidence of what was actually in the best interest in terms of public health, they were basicially just overwhelmed with all cases in schools and system fell apart.

A shambles.

While I understand why they are doing this I have to agree with iamwhoiam and appledrop .

People should be kept informed so they can evaluate their own particular risks in each family .

I have friends and family who regularly visit with their school age children . I also have very immunocompromised son who will not be getting an extra vaccine shot for another month at least.

I gave advised him that he is going to have to cocoon until he gets this extra dose and Iwill be asking people to stay away with their children until that is done .

There are grandparents who mind their grandchildren or others who don't have that choice .

Fair enough , we are on the way out of this , but I can't understand why they are throwing caution to the wind so abruptly like this .

Do you not agree that it is strange that parents are not only being told that there is no need to know if their children have been in contact with a positive case ,which will from now always be a symptomatic case ?

I think if your child has no symptoms , then away to school as advised, but at least with the knowledge should you need to protect someone as I have described in my above post .

Cases in children 5 to12 years have been rising in the weeks since return to school from higher base and in higher numbers than previously, yet the narrative from NPHET and the HSE has been that they are reducing !

That is talking about and including the 12 to18 year olds where cases have been slowing since they are vaccinated .

But not in the primary schoolchildren .

I think it is mad stuff tbh , after the caution all along .

.

Oh yes the infections are not serious I agree .

Still infections though and the possibility of transmission to vulnerable who have yet to have a booster or extra shot is there . Not to mention I disagree that we should be saying" sure infections in children are mild "because it is an unknown what high infection rates in children will lead to .

I find it a bit obnoxious of those in our Public Health to be insinuating , without saying directly of course, that we can let it rip in children.

Because that is what they are doing .

Colm Henry quite specifically mentioned" 0 to 18 year olds " in that statement the other day ,instead of 5 to 12 year olds .

That was deliberate , and I am disappointed in their manipulation of the numbers to achieve an end ,that parents stop worrying about their children catching it and that children are back in school,and all is well with the world. Because they have decided to pull the plug?

It's very sneaky .

Lisha, fair play to you for being safe but unless you actually test positive my understanding is she is safe to go to school?

Now I could be wrong, sure the whole thing is a mess we can't make head nor tail of it anymore.

It’s a bit of a grey Area from what I can read. But The school have put it in writing that a child isn’t to attend school if someone at home is waiting on a test result. In the past when one of us was waiting on a result gp said both stay off school. So that what I’m going by.. school are not great to deal with in general so I’m taking the safest option. Anyway I’d have to drive her to school which people could say is wrong until I’ve a result back.

thanks for your replies

No one is forcing or asking anyone else to isolate or stay off school . The issue is that parents should at very least be informed so they can make choices to suit their circumstances .

There are families out there who have children on chemo or children post a transplant . They need to know if a sibling is a close contact of a positive case of Covid 19

Perhaps they should have informed his mother if there was a flu going around

It would then be her choice how to proceed . Its common decency in my opinion to protect a vulnerable child in a classroom

How odd . Any vulnerable child on chemotherapy should be protected by those around him . You would think people didnt need to be told that .

Most classes have a parents whatapp group for such circumstances .

Absolutely . Without going in to details I know for a fact that our local primary school has such an alert system in place

But I am confident that despite the HSE throwing these kids to the wolves that the school will continue to protect them in their own way .

Our school are still going to inform if there is a case in the class and then people can make their own decisions. Happy enough with that tbh.

Sent one to school today while other was awaiting test results. Boy in school was well with no symptoms so we just have to crack on with things now. Test came back not detected anyway.

Yeah, that’s what I felt was the right thing. It’s hard though. Like ye we are after a run if it. People definitely feel that it’s all gone away. It bloody well hasn’t.

Actually I just looked it up and we should have kept both home. My bad.

Wow, that's a dramatic decrease

I'd imagine the decrease was largely thanks to isolating and testing asymptomatic kids. Having 10,000+ pupils out wasn't necessarily the right approach, but I'd argue did curtail outbreaks. Again, I imagine outbreaks will bounce right back up now, but now we won't know as we're not looking anymore.

I just don't understand why there wasn't a middle ground, if you're going to scale back on the testing, invest in the HEPA filters, it's a fraction of the cost that has been spent on testing since schools returned, and would have given anxious parents like me a huge sense of relief. They're just better for kids health and concentration anyway.

Nah, it won't be as costly as you imagine. There's all that PUP and other payments to claw tax in from plus the non-PUP rate is at about 6.5%.

More than masks would need to go. Sanatising desks after every class/ staggered breaks/ base classrooms/ return of lockers/ windows open all day/ classroom doors open/ full capacity classes/ removal of social distancing etc.

Oh ya I'm aware of that, I was just referring to secondary.