‘It’s not your fault,” I told 16-year-old Cara, whose mother died of a SARSCoV-2 infection she gave her. To be clear, the doctor confirmed Cara (not her real name) had passed on the virus and Covid was entered on the death certificate as the cause of death. Cara’s mother had not been outside their home in the weeks preceding her death.
When masks were dropped in the “Omicron’s mild” phase of the pandemic, Cara continued as the lone masker at school to protect her immunocompromised mother, who was undergoing chemotherapy. It was tolerable until a child psychotherapist said on the national airwaves that some girls would continue to mask anyway “to hide their acne”.
His words were used to bully her. Cara left, but without support from teachers she struggled. Her parents pleaded with the school to use the Hepa filter they bought. The school refused.
Cara eventually returned to school unmasked, caught Covid and infected her mam. It killed her. Cara self-harms because she blames herself. She hasn’t been to school since.
Research shows that more than 70pc of SarsCoV-2 transmission in households started with a child.
The incidence was highest during unmitigated in-person schooling. In a recent paper, Dr Pantea Javidan, of Stanford’s Centre for Human Rights, described the ways children’s rights to life, health and safety during the ongoing pandemic have been falsely rendered oppositional to education and development.
Methods used to manufacture consent to forcibly, repeatedly infect children, according to Dr Javidan, include minimising harms to children (“kids don’t get it or spread it”, “it’s mild”) and moral panic around mental health and educational attainment.
Regarding mental health, in August a study looking at paediatric psychiatric emergencies found school openings – not lockdowns – were associated with an increase in the number of emergency psychiatric visits.
In May, a study found that children with and without congenital heart defects showed increased risks for a variety of cardiovascular outcomes (including cardiac arrest, clots, palpitations) after Sars-CoV-2 infection.
In July, a study found that children and teenagers experienced cognitive impairment 12 months post-Covid infection, consistently correlated with poorer sleep and behavioural and emotional functioning.
Last month alone, several studies were published documenting Covid paediatric harms. One found that children and adolescents experience prolonged symptoms post-Sars-CoV-2 infection in almost every organ system.
Study co-author Professor Lawrence C Kleinman said: “We have convincing evidence that Covid is not just a mild, benign illness for children. This is a new chronic illness in children. We need to be prepared to deal with it for a generation.”
Another study analysing paediatric and adult hospitalisations found teenagers were at greatest risk of severe disease among all children. Yet another study showed compelling connections between viral infection and subsequent autoimmune disease. Early in the pandemic, some children showed negligible Covid symptoms, only to later develop organ failure.
Researchers found the children’s immune systems had latched on to a part of the coronavirus that closely resembles a protein found in the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes and GI tract and launched a catastrophic attack on their own tissues. “Experts” who claimed asymptomatic paediatric Sars2 infections equals mild were catastrophically wrong.
Covid is consistently a leading cause of US child mortality. Paediatric mortality has increased markedly with each year of the pandemic in the US, UK and elsewhere. In 2022, over six times as many children died from Covid than from flu in the US.
The UN Convention on the Rights of a Child requires states to “recognise the right of the child to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health” and to fully implement this right. Children’s rights to education include a safe environment not harmful to their health.
Cara and her parents fought for these rights. They were denied, with devastating consequences. Irish schools are legally obliged to clean indoor air and prevent the spread of airborne diseases. Prevention plan? Three Hail Marys.
In year five of an airborne pandemic, parents, Dr Ciara Steele and Sinéad O’Brien set up Clean Air Advocacy Ireland.
Dr Steele said: “Children are vulnerable, they rely on adults to advocate on their behalf. They have a fundamental right to breathe clean, pathogen-free air in schools. That means CO2 monitors, Hepa filters and ventilation in every classroom.”
A recent study in Finland found air purifiers in day-cares led to a 30pc reduction in children’s illnesses. In March 2022, Italy’s Marche region installed mechanical ventilation in some schools, reducing Covid infections in classrooms by 82pc.
Education Minister Norma Foley previously committed €62m for Hepa filters in Irish schools. Where are they?
WHO advice is clear – protect yourself and loved ones from Covid. Stay home if sick, test, get boosted, ventilate, wear a mask when around others. Unless parents are prepared to say, “We do not consent to repeatedly exposing our children to biohazardous Sars2 in schools”, our consent will be presumed tacit.
My oldest kid starts school next fall. I can try to get them to wear a mask, wash their hands, be mindful of other kids who are sick. But they’ll be 4-years-old next fall. It shouldn’t be their responsibility to keep themselves safe.
What am I supposed to do? I can call and email drive down to the school as much as I can and demand air purifiers and stricter illness policies. I can talk to other parents and teachers and attend school board meetings. But when homeschooling is infeasible for our family, the only meaningful action is giving my kid a nasal spray in the morning and hoping for the best.
Death to America.
It's ridiculous. Elementary schools are petri dishes at the best of times. I remember seeing posts going around in the time people cared about covid pointing out that kinds will for sure be spitting on their hands and wiping it on other kids faces and yelling 'COVID!' because children are childish and don't understand the consequences of their actions and will therefore be contrarian edgelord little shits in some way or another, and I say this as someone who gets along with kids pretty well, it's just a part of growing up and it just takes one kid not taking it seriously to go all raccoon city within a week let alone kids with parents who don't take it seriously. I think the best option would maybe be to somehow fund substitute and student teachers to get more hours and therefore become full on teachers faster by having a from home option. I think it should be mandatory still but that ship has sailed. I work at a restaurant and a good few of past and present front of house do teaching by day and wait tables by night, put these people on a teach from home and learn from home online thing cause they're younger and know the tech better and it helps get more full blown teachers into the field cause it let's students get their hours in faster. Some degree of real teacher and school board would need to be playing a supervisory role but I think a lot of kids and a lot of teachers would prefer it. I know for sure my pal working Jr high would prefer it.
I’m actually an elementary teacher. I think a lot of adult underestimate how perfectly capable kids, even little kids, are at following social norms. The summer of 2020 so many anti-mask parents were sure “you’ll never get kids to wear masks!” But when many school went back in session that fall with mask mandates the kids did wear masks. Because everyone else was wearing masks. Given the choice many kids would prefer not to wear pants, but they do because it’s a social norm.
I’m the only person at my school who masks. I tell my students how I don’t want to get COVID or other illnesses and they look at me like I have two heads. It’s like COVID has destroyed basic hygiene knowledge.
I remember being reprimanded as a kid for sniffling my nose instead of blowing just it. I got yelled at once for spitting on the walkway outside of school because it was a disgusting and disrespectful thing to do. If a classmate sneezed without covering their mouth or into their hands they’d be a social pariah for the rest of the day. Nowadays I feel like I’m the only person in my students lives telling them basic fucking hygiene.
“Cover your mouth with your shirt or a tissue when you cough. No, not like that. You have to catch the germs. Yes, you actually have to trap them.”
“Take it out of your mouth. See, now there’s spit on your pencil. And you use your hand to write with that pencil. And you’re touching the tables where your friends sit. Do you think they want your spit on them?”
“Okay why in the world is your used tissue lying on your worksheet rather than in the trashcan? Yes, you have to do it again. I’m not grading your snot.”
“You still have to wash your hands after using the free-draw markers. 20 seconds. Warm water. Soap. Get your finger nails.”
“Hand sanitizer doesn’t clean off your hands. You literally just rubbed snot all over the your hands. No, you can’t just use more hand sanitizer.”
I could go on and on. But I think you get the picture. Kids have always been gross. But Jesus fucking Christ, you’d think a pandemic would make some of these basic hygiene practices common knowledge. Why the hell am I teaching 11-year-olds how to blow their noses and wash their hands?