Hundreds of primary school children sent home as more bubbles burst

Hundreds of primary school children have been sent home to self-isolate because of covid this week.

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Brighton and Hove News understands Fairlight Primary School has sent home four year groups and its nursery, Mile Oak has sent home several year groups and Goldstone Primary three year groups.

Brunswick Primary has sent home two year groups, Downs Infants two thirds of its pupils and Cottesmore St Mary’s one year group.

Schools are not just struggling with pupils being required to self-isolate, but also school staff, which often makes keeping children who have not been in contact with a positive case much harder.

Meanwhile, the situation in the city’s secondary schools, where hundreds were sent home last week, continues to be challenging in what for many is the last week of term.

Yesterday, Dorothy Stringer sent home all of year 10 and some of year 8, and today Varndean School has sent home several year 9 classes.

Kings School has told all its year 7 pupils to work from home, and has also sent home some pupils in years 8, 9 and 10.

Patcham is continuing to send home year 8 and 9 pupils whenever lateral flow tests are carried out on Mondays and Thursdays.

At BACA, five staff and 180 students are self isolating and at PACA, five staff and 54 students are isolating.

PACA Principal Mark Poston said: “In the last two weeks, we have seen an increase in students testing positive for covid.

“We have also had an increase in students and staff being asked to self-isolate.

“We have not seen any evidence of in-school transmission but the cases reflect the increase in covid rates in the local community.

“We have had a high number of staff who have been asked to self-isolate by the Track and Trace app, which has made staffing more challenging.”

We asked Brighton and Hove City Council yesterday how many positive cases in schools had been reported to it last week – information we understand it has circulated – and had received no response at the time of publication.

A spokesman said: “There are currently cases of covid in a number of city schools.

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“Individual schools follow PHE guidance in managing each case. Not all covid cases automatically lead to classes having to self-isolate.

“The number of classes self-isolating across the city fluctuates on a daily / hourly basis.

“We do not keep a running tally of how many schools across the city have classes self-isolating.”

The most recently published demographic rate for Brighton and Hove suggest cases among both five to nine-year-olds and 10 to 14-year-olds are now dropping.