Thread by @LucyofL

OK - A medium thread on what I think might happen over next few weeks as schools return. It's something I've been thinking a lot about lately. I'm not talking quantitative forecasts (I'll leave that to experts), I mean how it's likely to pan out in schools up & down the country

Caveat: I have ZERO scientific credentials - but my brain kind of likes to triangulate information to elaborate potential future scenarios. It's probably a bit sad, but I do this both in my personal and professional life - it's kind of how my brain is wired

As a nobody, I'm not in the least worried about the fall-out if I'm barking up the wrong tree....Indeed I will be utterly delighted if that proves to be the case. You can accuse me of #fearmongering, if you so wish - to which I'll respond with this: threadreaderapp.com/thread/1429724…

For all the 'school disruption' headlines, last academic year was a mixed picture. In hotspots, repeated bubble closures were a big issue - but elsewhere much less so. Also Delta only really hit during the summer term (during which school age cases rose consistently)

Against this backdrop of having seen limited impact, many parents just aren't that worried....All those bubble closures were overkill, right? Unnecessary disruption to education? My kid was forever off & never got sick?

Well, I reckon bubble closures & isolation were HIGHLY EFFECTIVE. If a viral host is kept away from other potential hosts, it can't go anywhere. Period. Maybe had a bit of spread pre-closure - but the closure stopped it going further.

In a few regions, the number of introductions was so high that the fire break of isolation was breached. - But across much of country that didn't happen.

But now that firebreak is gone.

Imagine of a pile of kindling surrounded by dry trees Sparks are falling. Eventually one will catch light.

Unless swiftly put out, all of a sudden, almost out of nowhere, there's a raging forest fire.

The speed of spread catches everyone by surprise.

That's my fear for schools this autumn. By the time schools hit the guideline '10%' confirmed cases before taking action, it will be a raging bushfire with unstoppable momentum. Infections grow exponentially. Add to that, PCRs typically take longer as demand ⬆️.

Assuming a 36-48hr delay, I fear that by the time the 10% figure is known, the bulk of the school community is already infected - and school closure is effectively 'baked in'.

Remember that this virus has an R0 of 6-7 - i.e. in a 'virgin' environment (no mitigations, immunity), each person would infect 6-7 others. In some areas, primaries are still pretty close to that 'virgin' state. That's just 3 rounds of infection until an entire school is down.

From the perspective of an individual school, what does that mean? - It means they need to be prepared for things to turn sour very, very quickly. Just a day (or even hours) delay in implementing mitigations, could make a vast difference to spread

When will a given school 'turn'? - I guess it'll be a function of community prevalence, individual school characteristics/policy, combined with a big dose of luck. As we already know, this virus is prone to over-dispersion. For some reason some people seem to be 'superspreaders'

Thus my prediction is that we'll start to see news stories of schools being overrun and closed. Just like this one in Scotland, who started back just last week: scotsman.com/health/coronav…

My guess is that national guidelines will change once such closures become widespread - as even with adults vaccinated, extremely high spread ultimately puts pressure on hospitals. But how does an individual school try to keep this scenario at bay until measures are re-instated?

My thinking is that it's around encouraging the parent community to voluntarily retain key elements of fire break. E.g.:
- Ask households w/ Covid to self-isolate as before
- Continue to inform close contacts; ask to stay away & do PCR 3-4 days post exposure & return if clear

This would go against some government guidelines - but schools also have a legal responsibility for ensuring H&S. As I understand it (others have posted on this that I can't seem to find) 'following gov guidelines' does not shield schools from legal responsibility for outbreaks

It's also unenforceable; some parents simply won't do it, but I think the majority who are able to, will. Maybe, that will be enough to ward off the 'let rip' scenario in your school?

So that's what I'm going to write to my kids' school about - asking that the Head use their 'soft power' to engage w/ the parent community to share info & encourage voluntary measures that will retain a partial 'fire break'. i.e. that we work together to keep our school safe.

One final thing - I suspect an awful lot of parents will be caught be surprise over the coming weeks. That lays the path for the "No-one could ever have predicted" excuse...

PLEASE PLEASE let's not allow the government/media get away with that.
@SafeEdForAll_UK @hivetosurvive