A quarter of a million students could be forced to self-isolate “unnecessarily” because of the government’s failure to amend its controversial stance on Covid tests in schools, headteachers warned tonight.
The Department for Education has decided that students who get a positive result from a lateral flow device (LFD) test in school should be sent home for 10 days even if they then go on to get a negative PCR result.
Heads say they have been told by the DfE that this is “because LFD tests taken on test sites have extremely low rates of false positives, because these tests are done in a controlled environment and trained staff read the results”.
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But the Association of School and College Leaders said: “We have pointed out [to the DfE] that ‘extremely low rates of false positives’ does not mean ‘no false positives’.
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“If the false positive rate for LFDs is around 1 per 1,000 (as is being widely reported), our modelling suggests that this policy could lead to about a quarter of a million pupils needing to self-isolate unnecessarily just as they should be getting back into school or college, plus about 25,000 parents also being required to self-isolate unnecessarily.
“It could also have a significant impact on the numbers of students and parents consenting to on-site testing. Frustratingly, it appears that this argument has fallen on deaf ears.”
ASCL’s case seemed to be illustrated today as 31 pupils were asked to self-isolate over a positive LFD test in school, even though a subsequent PCR test had a negative result.
Rachel Clarke, a palliative care doctor, said on social media that “after one day of school, my son and 30 other pupils are self-isolating at home for 10 days after one child had a positive school lateral flow test”.
You really, really couldn’t make this up.
After one day of school, my son & 30 other pupils are self-isolating at home for 10 days after one child had a positive school lateral flow test.
*Even though* the subsequent gold standard PCR test was negative. (1/n)
- Rachel Clarke (@doctor_oxford) March 9, 2021
“That’s 31 children denied face-to-face education for 10 whole days - even though [Number 10] allegedly clarified yesterday that PCR superseded LFTs. Sheer bureaucratic, unscientific madness,” she added.
The clarification Dr Clarke refers to came yesterday when Downing Street said that students who had positive LFD test results at home would receive a follow-up PCR test and that if they tested negatively, they could return to school.
However, the DfE is clear that this policy only applies for LFD tests taken at home and not in schools, and states: “In the event that the PCR test is negative - that they do not have Covid 19 - this overrides the lateral flow test if it was taken at home and they should therefore return to school.”
But it says: “Where a pupil’s test has been taken on site under supervision, the chance of it being incorrect is minimal so there is no need for a further test to confirm the result.”
Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the NEU teaching union, said: “It should have been obvious to everyone that no matter where a lateral flow test is taken, the PCR test is much more reliable - if a PCR test doesn’t confirm what a LFD test is saying, it should be the PCR test which is used.
“A lateral flow test is never, in whatever circumstances it’s taken - supervised or unsupervised - as reliable as a PCR test, so to have got themselves in this position is frankly very puzzling.”
