Improve test and trace before schools reopen, Sage report says

Study by scientific advisers warns of Covid-19 rise in England if system does not work

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Fully reopening schools without substantial improvements in the performance of the test-and-trace system could risk a new surge in cases of Covid-19, according to calculations by the government’s scientific advisers.

A report presented to the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) on 20 May, at a time when the government was weighing up the impact of school reopening in England, indicated little leeway for increasing school attendance and relaxing other physical distancing measures without a test-and-trace system that reaches 80% of contacts within 48 hours.

R, or the 'effective reproduction number', is a way of rating a disease’s ability to spread. It’s the average number of people on to whom one infected person will pass the virus. For an R of anything above 1, an epidemic will grow exponentially. Anything below 1 and an outbreak will fizzle out – eventually.

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from Children | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31lu8Ny