I understand completely the reasoning for wanting children to return to #schools, but I don’t understand what responsible government would risk this *at this moment in time* knowing (or not knowing the following: (please retweet)
1) More and more children are being diagnosed with a mysterious #Kawasaki syndrome like disease (PIMS-TS). And worryingly, some children, including in the U.K. have died from it. Thankfully, more and more research is being done now, but some of the early information is worrying:
The syndrome seems to appear around 4-6 weeks after the children were infected by #COVID19. As our peak was only around 4 weeks ago, it’s entirely possible that we’ll start seeing more cases. So far, there have been 100+ in France, 100+ in New York State, ~100 in the U.K... 
And there are reports of more cases every day primarily from European countries and areas of the United States (places where, you guessed it, the peak of the virus occurred around 4-6 weeks ago).
Clearly, ~100 cases is not that large as a proportion of children (not that that provides any comfort to the family of the victims of this horrible syndrome), but crucially we don’t yet know how many children have already been, and will be affected...
This could be due to the fact that until recently, Covid-19 was considered to simply be a respiratory illness, but children who are presenting with Kawasaki like symptoms, are showing no evidence of a Covid infection, at least externally - so until larger numbers of children...
...started entering hospitals with this syndrome, it’s possible that some early cases were missed and the potential link with covid wasn’t discovered. A preliminary study from Bergamo in Italy suggests around 1 in 1000 children will be affected (more than normal Kawasaki)...
So although that may sound small, put in context it could *potentially* affect 13.5k children (best data I could find said that 21% of the U.K. population is below the age of 18). Of course, it could affect many fewer children than that, or many more. The point is we don’t know.
This, from the Governor of New York sums it up very well:
So, is it wise to send children back to school while only having very limited information about this syndrome? It is particularly concerning that the syndrome only seems to become apparent 4-6 weeks after being infected. ie. we won’t know if there’s a problem until it’s too late.
2) This doesn’t even take into account the potential danger to teachers: children are notoriously bad with personal hygiene, which is why they are super-spreaders of flu. Thankfully, there’s seems to be some very early evidence suggesting that this isn’t the case for covid...
But there is definitely no conclusive evidence, especially after the recent ONS survey suggesting that children were just as likely, if not more likely, to catch the virus:
This creates problems because not only are the children potentially effective at spreading the virus in their own household (to parents and older siblings who have more social contacts outside of the house) they are also potentially able to transmit the virus to their teachers...
So, what happens if teachers have underlying health conditions, or their partners have underlying health conditions, or they are above the age of 60, or if they live with their parents? These are just some of the potential issues.
Headlines like this are absolutely disgusting, because they refuse to acknowledge the fact that there are very real concerns both for the safety of students, teachers and the wider community...
None of this means that the arguments *for* sending children back to school are invalid - many of them are really very important - especially for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged but what I’m highlighting here is a) how much there still is to learn about the virus and...
b) Stop being so inconsiderate towards teachers, to further a political agenda, or otherwise. They would give anything to get children back in school, but they have very legitimate concerns about the effects of reopening schools.
So, to sum up:
1) There is still so much to learn about this virus:
- The extent to which children can transmit the virus
- How common is this Kawasaki-like syndrome?
- How severe is this syndrome?
1) There is still so much to learn about this virus:
- The extent to which children can transmit the virus
- How common is this Kawasaki-like syndrome?
- How severe is this syndrome?
2) Teachers (and parents) are rightly concerned: about the dangers to themselves, the danger to their families and the danger to the community if schools are reopened.
Of course, schools should be reopened as soon as possible. But crucially, this should only be when it is either absolutely safe to do so, or, when the risks are fully appreciated and understood and measures are in place to mitigate them.
If anyone else has any points I’d be very interested to hear them.
Now, disclaimer: I am not a scientist, not a teacher and not even a parent. I am angry at the headlines though, and just thought I’d try and articulate some of the key concerns...
Now, disclaimer: I am not a scientist, not a teacher and not even a parent. I am angry at the headlines though, and just thought I’d try and articulate some of the key concerns...
Afaik, I’ve only included known facts, or, where the facts aren’t entirely known, I’ve made this clear. Indeed, the key theme of this thread is that *we don’t know enough about this disease yet*. If you agree (or disagree) pls retweet so more ppl can see/give their views.
