Covid testing in schools is ‘hugely disruptive and should be scrapped’ as 60 per cent of positive results are ‘wrong’

DAILY Covid testing in schools could lead to disruption to education and should be scrapped, experts have said.

It comes as data analysis showed that up to 60 per cent of positive lateral flow test results turn out to be negative when checked through PCR.

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Professor Sir Andrew Pollard, who led the Oxford vaccine programme, said the impact created by regular testing on children’s education means it could be easier to vaccinate them against the virus.

He told The Telegraph that children are generally not severely affected by Covid, but if the daily testing programme picks up a lot of cases, it means pupils have to self-isolate and will not be able to attend classes.

The expert explained: “I think that impact on education could be a reason for vaccination.

“If children aren’t very much affected, then the testing is obviously not protecting them as they’re not very affected. So is the testing being done to protect other people?”

About 200 schools around the country are now taking part in a trial to evaluate whether daily testing could replace self-isolation.

SCHOOL TRIAL

It means that if a student is identified as a positive case, others in their class will be offered a daily test instead of self-isolation for seven days.

Students who test positive are also offered a PCR test on Day 2 and Day 7, while other students will mainly be given later flow tests.

The main stage of the trial started in April with a small number of schools participating in an early phase of the trial, which began in mid March, the Government said.

A spokesman for the Department of Education said they would review daily contact testing as a potential replacement for self-isolation at the end of this month.

But today, 23 British academics wrote to Education Secretary Gavin Williamson to warn him about the potential impact of testing on education.

It comes as analysis by The Telegraph showed that lateral flow tests are also giving a number of false positives.

Around a third of lateral flow tests have come back negative after being checked against the more accurate PCR tests.

In March, that percentage rose to 60 per cent, when 379 of the 624 positive tests were found to be wrong.

But last year, a study in Liverpool also found that the tests failed to spot positive cases around 50 per cent of the time.

Recent analysis by NHS Test and Trace, however, found that lateral flow tests have a specificity of at least 99.9 per cent.

This means that for every 1,000 lateral flow tests carried out, there is fewer than one false positive result.

Experts say that false positive could not only cause disruption in schools, but also make tracking the pandemic harder.

At the moment, a decision on whether to recommend jabs for children has not been made yet.

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation is evaluating the risks and benefits and will inform ministers on its recommendation.

But yesterday, a source close to the committee claimed vaccination for children is unlikely to be recommended, The Times reports.

The insider said: “There just isn’t the value in it. They are very clear they don’t think it’s appropriate and feel very strongly that children should not be vaccinated.”

A Government spokesperson said: “A small percentage of secondary schools and colleges are participating in an independently-monitored, voluntary trial of Daily Contact Testing as a replacement for self-isolation, which has been given approval by Public Health England’s Research and Ethics Governance Group.

“The trial concludes at the end of June, at which point the findings will be considered to inform any future use of Daily Contact Testing in schools.”