Vigilance key to keep classrooms open

Pupils wearing face masks and coverings at Holyrood Secondary School in Glasgow last year. Picture: John Devlin

The status of schools has been something of a yardstick in the fight against coronavirus. When they closed in March last year, the lockdown that quickly followed felt inevitable. As Scottish children returned to lessons in August, there was perhaps an optimism among many that the worst of the pandemic was behind us and that other aspects of daily life would soon return to normal for good.

Of course that optimism, such as it was, turned out to be misplaced, and to avoid making the same mistakes again we must understand that the return to classrooms does not signify victory over the virus but merely progress in its suppression.

That progress is precious and must be protected by measures such as parents wearing masks and observing physical distancing at schools gates. As Education Secretary John Swinney said yesterday: "We've all got to play a part, not just the school environment but the whole surrounding environment of society, to make sure that we do all that we can to suppress the virus."

But epidemiologist Dr Deepti Gurdasani went further, by dismissing claims from Scotland's national clinical director Jason Leitch that younger children are "less likely to get or pass on the virus", which she said was “wrong” and based on “flawed” and “biased” studies.

She described the return of children to classrooms without extra measures to reduce transmission as "really concerning" and called for children from the age of six to wear face masks, along with increased focus on ventilation.

The EIS teaching union has also raised concerns about safety and said a blended learning model would be more appropriate.

In reopening schools we are walking a fine line, balancing the risk of further transmission of the disease against the risk of further interrupting the education of a generation of children.

Parents, teachers and pupils must all be especially vigilant over the coming weeks and months to keep transmission rates down and ensure we do not have to go through all this again.