Schools could open in March if other lockdown measures remain

According to research from University College London, Oxford University and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, reopening schools to all pupils in early March is feasible, as long as other lockdown measures continue.

It says the least risky scenario would be to open primaries and only exam-critical years in secondary schools.

This could keep R below 1, which would mean spread of the disease should continue to shrink, rather than grow.

But the study says that lifting other restrictions at the same time as opening schools would be a bad idea, in the short to medium term, as new infections could increase sharply.

However, the researchers said that a rapid vaccination programme could potentially prevent this, depending on the transmission-blocking properties of the vaccines.

They included the likely protective effect of vaccine rollout in their calculations, as well as the threat from the more contagious new UK 'Kent' variant of coronavirus that is spreading in the UK.

Lead author Dr Jasmina Panovska-Griffiths, from UCL, said: "Our findings suggest that reopening schools on March 8, while keeping the rest of society locked down, is a plausible alternative to continued full national lockdown and is likely to prevent the epidemic from growing again.

"Opening secondary schools appears to result in higher infection levels than opening primaries so additional strategies may be needed to mitigate this. These could include staggered re-openings as well as expansion of mass-testing at schools, and vaccination of teachers."

Co-author from UCL Prof Russell Viner, who is also president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, said: "The UK Government has emphasised that schools should be the first area of society to fully reopen. It is therefore critical to establish how different scenarios of reopening schools might affect infection rate and deaths."