East Riding Health Officials Monitoring School Return

As Schools returned today after the lockdown East Riding Council Public Health Director Andy Kingdom said he and other officials would be watching infection rates and trends “like a hawk” to see whether the return fuels outbreaks.

Mr Kingdom added he expected infections to rise as more people mix but the degree to which coronavirus transmits to the elderly and clinically vulnerable would be the key test.

The return to school is the first step in the government’s roadmap out of lockdown and Mr Kingdom said its consequences would be the litmus test for whether to proceed with further easing.

The director said:

“Monday will be the first test, and we’re hoping children and their parents will lead the way.

“Care homes were the battlefield of the pandemic for a long time, but now parents and children will be on the front line.

“The problem is the signal this sends out, there could be the assumption that this is all over and it’s just a matter of moving through a series of dates of easing.

“But it’s not a straight line, when pupils go back to school there will be more social interaction and that means more infections and potentially more deaths.

“The reason why there’s five weeks between Monday’s reopening and the next easing is so we can see the effect.

“If people don’t stick to the rules as they have been doing then that can push the numbers up quickly.

“We’re still dealing with a highly transmissible, infectious disease and with schools coronavirus will be passed between a lot of children and parents who haven’t had the vaccine yet.

“Then it’s a question of if it’s being spread to the most vulnerable, if it is then we’ve got to not do the next date, push it back and wait until we have more people vaccinated.”

The director said the vaccination programme in the East Riding continued to show “really good” progress over the last week.

He added he was confident the target to get everyone in the top nine priority groups vaccinated by Thursday, April 15 would be met and could even be beaten.

Mr Kingdom said:

“Almost 125,000 people in the East Riding have had their first dose now out of the roughly 340,000 living here.

“About 97 per cent of over 70s have had theirs, we’ve done about 60 per cent of the 60 to 70 year olds and even 30 per cent of 50 to 60 year olds that we’ve picked up because of their underlying health conditions, but we didn’t expect to have done that many already.

“The East Riding is among the best performing areas in the country for that.

“There were worries that we wouldn’t hit the April 15 target date, but given the direction we’re going in there’s a lot less worries now.”

The director said the council was also drawing up plans to launch a rehabilitation programme to help people struggling to get over coronavirus, including those with ‘long covid’.

He added that although only around one in five people who catch coronavirus develop long term affect effects, those could still be debilitating.

Mr Kingdom said:

“Long covid lasts for about five weeks after the initial infection, that’s the most common timescale.

 

“In some cases it can last for about 12 weeks, but only in about one in ten cases.

“Unlike coronavirus long covid effects more than just the respiratory system, it impacts on multiple organs and the metabolic system.

“Fatigue is the most common symptom, but it produces a whole host of others including tiredness, a loss of taste and smell and muscle aches.

“For people who get it it can upset their daily lives, they can’t work as well particularly if they do a more physical job, but it affects some people more than others.

“That’s why the council’s going to set up the rehabilitation service once leisure centres are back open, so people can get help getting back to normal life.”

Mr Kingdom said residents should remember that while today is a “key moment” in the journey out of lockdown, it will not be the end.

The director said:

“We need to get the return to schools right and make sure we’re not sending out the wrong message that this is over, it’s not.

“We need to take these steps carefully and gradually, 20, 30 and 40 year olds won’t be getting vaccinated until about June or July so infections can still spread.

“Ultimately I’m confident that we can, most people in the East Riding know the measures and rules now and most just get on with it.”