Northern Ireland

Safe schools – reappraisal required?

For politicians, keeping schools open has become totemic regardless of mounting evidence
For politicians, keeping schools open has become totemic regardless of mounting evidence For politicians, keeping schools open has become totemic regardless of mounting evidence

MINISTER Edwin Poots' introduction of `inter-communal' angles to the Covid debate is dangerous.

Myriad factors affect the R rate, including social deprivation, family size, housing quality, availability and over-crowding.

High infection rates in Mid-Ulster, for instance, may be influenced by industrial food production with high levels of migrant labour, often living in cramped circumstances.

Schools matter, too.

The 2018 school population census breakdown of 51 per cent Catholic to 33 per cent Protestant may partially explain infection spikes in Derry/Strabane, Belfast, Mid-Ulster, Newry and Mourne and

Fermanagh.

Other factors contribute, but we cannot discount the school effect. It is complacent to underplay the degree to which children can spread the virus, and where transmission rates may be understated.

Schools, in short, now appear less safe than we thought.

As teachers and staff take a Halloween break it allows us to reflect on the school effect on Covid.

In June, Northern Ireland enjoyed the lowest infection rates of any UK region. Teachers unions agreed with minister Weir for a partial return to school, with social distancing maintained.

The executive balanced health risks against lost jobs and devastated lives within a gravely weakened economy. A unanimous executive were entitled to make policy and teachers worked hard from August to make the arrangements functional.

Schools assessed risk, mitigated danger, and reorganised practice to reduce unnecessary contact. Notwithstanding, distancing in secondary schools proved challenging.

By half term. Northern Ireland's infection rate was the highest of any UK region. Derry/Strabane led the UK league-tables with the highest district council rate. Cases diagnosed and close contacts identified led to a proliferation of self-isolation.

Protective bubbles, introduced as a `firebreak' to infection, broke down. The Danish bubble concept of six was eschewed, with classes of 25-30 or year-groups of up to 200 identified as bubbles - traducing the whole concept.

The received wisdom of the European Centre for the Control of Disease (which the chief medical and scientific officers in the UK, Ireland and across Europe tend to rely upon) is that children transmit at

lower rates. This is now contradicted by mounting research that children transmit the disease at the same or higher rates than adults.

Professor Paul Hunter of East Anglia University, a credible source, indicates that "it has become clear that there is a link between closing schools and controlling the spread of the virus". He is supported by a recent study by the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Jonathan Ball, Professor for Molecular Virology at Nottingham University, warns about the risks of reopening schools, saying "we do know" that children "can be very good incubators or spreaders".

A recent study undertaken by Princeton University of over half a million people in the Indian states of Andhra and Tamil Nadu identified close to 85,000 live Covid cases. Although children had lower

death rates, the study showed children transmitting illness in high numbers, even when asymptomatic, with an 18 per cent transmission rate for children aged 5-17.

A new research study in South Korea confirms the same.

Dr William Hanage, an epidemiologist at the Harvard School of Public Health has questioned the international statistics base, and asserts a bias in recording children as the source of transmission, with default assumptions made that household transmission is from `adult to children'. Can we trust that children are ineffective transmitters? I doubt it.

On Radio Ulster last week, Dr Gabriel Scally, president of epidemiology at the Royal Society of Medicine and a renowned local expert in public health, scathingly criticised the availability of statistics on Covid-19 in Northern Ireland as "transparent as a brick wall".

The Northern Ireland chief medical and scientific officers recommended a longer ‘circuit-breaking’ four to six weeks closure of schools.

For politicians, keeping schools open has become totemic regardless of mounting evidence. It is far from clear that the additional week at half-term agreed by the executive will impact the infection rate sufficiently.

Reopening schools should now take a precautionary approach. A strategy of "learning to live with Covid" could probably achieve close to full attendance in primary schools. In secondaries, class sizes should reduce, with two-metre social distancing reinstated. A sustainable approach would see a rotational, part-time, school attendance supplemented with webinars, set and downloaded homework, remote support, e-learning, and (with correct safeguards) more live tuition in small groups.

Face-to-face teaching should focus on quality discussion of pre-set work. Protective bubbles should act as small firebreaks of 6-8 in size. An evidence-based school restart depends on less complacency and avoiding the mantra that children are unlikely to transmit the virus.

:: Mark Langhammer is Regional Secretary of the National Education Union in Northern Ireland.