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

That won't be happening

Don't think that will happen, vaccine has reduced incidence of severe illness relative to case numbers. You might see certain sectors have reduced capacity, opening hours again but I don't think schools will close again unless a vaccine-resistant strain emerges which is hopefully unlikely.

Delta so good at spreading other varients not getting a chance so far.

Do you have HEPA filters in class yet or are you relying on opening the windows. Noting is stopping you from telling parents of a case, "guide lines" aren't laws and what will they do to you, there is a shortage of teachers, tell the boards of management to back you and do whatever feels right.

Schools went out a message to watch out for kids puking and then testing positive no other symptoms thankfully have you seen that?

I work with somebody who had TB, the HSE contacted the company, we meet with them and HR no name was mentioned we all knew who it was, We all had to get tested, sometimes it has to happen and on the scale of things it's 1 out of 10 so get over it get on with it and do it.

I don't give a rats ass if its xyz's job to do it, if it needs to happen and it's not then somebody else should step in. As far a GDPR breaches of it's tiny, "a child in you child's class tested positive please be vigilant". Companies do much worse all the time and nothing ever happens to them.

Our cub scouts had a positive case who had been at a meeting. They were told by the HSE that they were to do nothing. The advice was (at the time) still that they should be tested if they show symptoms whether they're close contacts.

My own son got it in school. Turns out there was another child with it a few days earlier but noone was told. I don't know if the school were even told. I let the parents of his table mates know.

As for measures like eating in the hall, unfortunately we have 1 hall for 1200 students so that wouldn't work for us. Nor cleaning classrooms during short breaks with one fogger as there are just too many rooms.

But the staff shortages are the biggest problems, both teachers and SNAs.

Have you tried for a test via your GP? Think they get an allocation to register per day. Worth refreshing the page too, cancellations do pop up every few minutes, but you have to be lightning fast!

Yes call your gp. They can get slots. And do the antigen test anyway.

Read someone say c02 monitor is like going on a rollercoaster with no seat belt on, you get a glimpse of the speed limit as you plummet over the edge!

if you breach GDPR, what can they do to you? Or the school. It wouldn't even be slap on the wrist. Tell them to F-Off. I've had my personal details leaked by Paddy Power, LinkedIn, and lately Fastway who had a customer database on a server exposed to the internet with no password and nothing happened to them. Teachers provide an essential service and there is a shortage of them. You should be getting on to you union and asking for vote to strike of proper air handling isn't in the class by Jan 1st. My kids teacher is back from two weeks sick leave, don't know if it was covid but she looks like death warmed up today and she's young.

I just don’t know. We are very lucky with our gp. He always seems to return calls.

Your daughter may have had covid a while ago as opposed to right now, especially if she's asymptomatic. Antigen tests have different criteria to the PCR tests. If I did an antigen one right now it would be -ve but a PCR would more than likely be +ve, because I had covid last month (which my 9 yr old brought home from school!!). That's why they give you a covid recovery cert, if you're travelling or doing something that needs a PCR test it would likely still be +ve up to 6 mths later. So you get a recovery cert that's valid for 6 mths.

We got notification today of outbreak of chickenpox in class so we can keep an eye and watch out for symptoms.

Makes total sense, but yet the school is not allowed notify us of a case of Covid in the class?

It's a disgrace, not schools fault but government hiding behind GDPR nonsense but OK if its headlice or chicken pox for parents to be informed.

Yeah, fully agree, just wondering when there are lots of comments about antigens not being great because there are lots being neg then pcr pos. Especially in asymptomatic cases. I personally think if they were to do antibody tests on a full class in a primary school that a lot more would be shown to have had covid than were ever tested. It's absolutely ripping through the "safe" schools.

I wasn't attacking teachers. Where did you get that from?

Me too tbh. My kids are too young to be affected by the recommendation but I just think it’s a horrible idea for primary kids.