Re-opening schools to all pupils during the continued covid-19 outbreak poses at least three possible threats:

To the pupils themselves

To the staff both working in schools and also transporting children to and from school

To family members of these two groups.

So, what do we know about deaths from covid-19. The NHS weekly data on the deaths of patients who have died in hospitals in England and have tested positive for Covid-19 are shown in the table below. All deaths were reported during the period up to the 15^th July 2020.

Age group		Pre-existing condition: Yes	Pre-existing condition: No	Unknown presence of pre-existing condition	Total
0 – 19 years		16	4	0	20
20 – 39		177	33	0	210
40 – 59		1,993	265	0	2,258
60 – 79		10,499	569	0	11,068
80+		15,082	508	0	15,590
Unknown age		0	0	0	0

Source england.covid19dailydeaths@nhs.net

 Because it isn’t clear when covid-19 really started affecting the population, it is also worth looking at the ONS data for all registered deaths in 2020. Those in the 5-19 age groupings amount to 606 from all causes. This compares with more than 11,000 in the 55-59 age grouping and more than 15,000 in the 60-64 age grouping. Data is up to 3^rd July 2020. https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/weeklyprovisionalfiguresondeathsregisteredinenglandandwales

School pupils may well catch covid-19 and transmit it, but it seems not to be fatal for school-age pupils in any numbers, even though every death is a tragedy for the family.

The ONS also report on testing in the community that excludes care homes, hospitals and other institutional settings. The commented that ‘Statistical testing also indicates that there is not enough evidence to say with confidence that community infection rates over the study period differ between age groups. However, when analysing the different infection rates by age, it is important to recognise that community settings do not include people in institutional settings, such as care homes.’ https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19infectionsinthecommunityinengland/july2020

However, the unweighted data does show lower percentages of young people testing positive for covid-19, but there are wide confidence intervals in the data. More age related testing is needed.

The threat is obviously greater to adults that come into contact with both children and other adults in school settings or by transporting pupils to and from schools.

Looking at the wider data, there are obviously some groups at higher risk than others, and school staff in these groups, whether teachers or support staff may need better shielding from possible infection. Perhaps the highest risk groups should not have contact with large groups of children until a vaccine is in place?

As I have said before, the system should be ‘hoping for the best, but planning for the worst’. It seems as if local lockdowns are almost inevitable through at least part of the next school-year, and planning to cope with such occurrences should be high on the agenda of officials.

For this reason, I have previously advocated a supernumerary scheme for NQTs without a teaching post for September. I still think such a move would be sensible.