Summer exams in Scotland may be cancelled for a third successive year as new Government guidance means that entire classes will have to self-isolate if even one case of the Omicron variant is detected. While First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has stressed her commitment to keeping schools open, she admits that there will be a “period of disruption”. The Times has the story.
While Nicola Sturgeon said she would “bust a gut” to keep schools open, leading educationalists warned that the new guidance was likely to be “highly disruptive of children’s education” and would inevitably damage their mental health.
It came as teachers’ unions called for the early closure of schools to “fend off a new wave of infection”.
The First Minister said that there would be a “period of disruption” but insisted that there would be no “blanket” closures of schools.
“Nobody wants that,” she said. “Of course, if there are outbreaks of infections in schools then there needs to be a response to that, but I’m very clear about the importance of minimising the disruption to children’s education.”
She said that under the new guidance “all household contacts of any Covid case should isolate for ten days, regardless of the vaccination status and even if they initially get a negative PCR test”.
The new variant, added Jason Leitch, the national clinical director, had an “attack rate” of 50%. “If you have a room of 100 people and a single unknown Omicron case is in that room, you could in the days after that, find 50, 60 or 70 positives,” he said.
Read More; Scotland May Cancel Summer Exams due to Omicron Outbreaks
