PCR test for close contacts in Y3 and Y6
Dear parents and carers,
For children who are currently isolating in Year 3 and Year 6 due to school bubble closures
Like almost every school in North Tyneside, we currently have a number of children and staff who are unfortunately having to isolate. If your child is currently isolating, PHE has asked for all of those who are isolating as a close contact to have a PCR test before returning to school.
Before your child is due to return to school, we require all isolating children to have had a PCR test and to confirm the results with the school office via info@kingedward.org
Where other year groups in school have been asked to take PCR tests, it has identified asymptomatic cases. This is the vital reason why testing is so important.
Why we require PCR tests to be taken
You may know from both the local and national press that cases of COVID in schools are currently quite high. Unfortunately this has resulted in significant groups of children and students having to isolate, in schools across the country. This is not due to decisions being made by schools, but due to the national advice of Public Health England. This is to try and reduce the spread of the more transmissible variant of COVID, especially amongst those who may have little or no symptoms.
Impact on our children and community
We fully understand how difficult these isolations are for our children and families. The very last thing any school ever wants to do is to send children home. That is why taking precautionary PCR tests is so important at the moment. We need to do all that we can as a school community to try and prevent as many children and families having to undertake any more isolations before the end of term.
A small number of our year groups have had more bubble isolations than others. Some families have also experienced more isolations than others, making work and family life extremely difficult. So every returning child with a negative PCR test protects every other child and family in the school from risk of other isolations.
This has been a truly challenging and difficult year for all of our children, families and staff. We very much hope that there are changes to the current guidelines before September. As always, we await any updates and DfE changes in the press along with you. Thank you very much for your support with ensuring all returning children are negative before coming back into school.
If your child has tested positive for Covid within the last 90 days and school is aware of this, they will not need to be PCR tested.
Miss Byrne
Head teacher
