Lockdown has indirectly made Children’s immune systems weaker
They haven’t been able to naturally get and recover from illnesses
Let’s learn from our mistakes
I wonder how many of the 15 were seen by a doctor but also failed by that doctor? Also did any of the parents attempt to get an appointment and we unable to?
Seems like they’re desperate to prescribe nothing if they give an appointment at all.
This needs proper leadership now. There’s two things that are important here…it’s low risk per cases, so stop terrifying everyone their kids will die AND despite all the big talk, we don’t have the antibiotics widely available like the government claim. I have several friends who are pharmacists and they can’t access these drugs. It’s being widely reported there aren’t enough.
This is why you need proper leadership to give clear advice and ensure it stops at 15. It is an easy cure with just some antibiotics, so this doesn’t need to be something scary or fatal
What I’m hearing from all this is that if you’re worried about your child having serious symptoms, and you can’t access a GP, go to A and E.
Of course they’re overwhelmed too. But what’s the alternative?
Currently a three week wait for a gp in our area, assuming you can even get thru on the phone. It may be different if the patient is a child. But still. If my child was worsening rapidly I’d be straight to A and E. And I bet other parents would be the same.
Almost like under funding your health service leads to people dying unnecessarily, including children.
Yesterday morning it was 6 dead over the last couple weeks.
By the end of yesterday it was 9.
And today its 15.
I’ll say exactly the same as I said in yesterday’s thread… Historically 1-2 children die of Strep A **over the entire winter period**. According to the MET office we aren’t even in Winter yet (starts 21st of December this year). To have lost 15 children **already** is totally unacceptable.
Yesterday I had someone telling me not be alarmist, saying that cases had “roughly” doubled. That last year we had 4 deaths of Strep A not 1-2, whilst at the same time saying we “couldn’t use last year’s data” when showing that it was closer to a tenfold increase, not the “roughly double” they sugggested.
We need action on this, now. Write to your MP’s and make a fuss, our children deserve better than this, especially after the sacrifices we have asked them to make recently.
Just to put some objectivity into this very sad trend.
There could easily be 100,000 cases (and probably more) active right now.
So that’s a death rate of 0.015% as the worst case scenario. Obviously the usual platitudes of “1 death is too many and tragic” apply, but that goes without saying.
Very scary for parents and im not sure what the answer is? As a government, I would NOT encourage antibiotics for all, as we don’t have them and it could cause some nasty strain-mutations. As a parent, I’d demand them at the slightest fever because they don’t offer rapid Strep test.
EDIT: Yes the UKHSA have reported 900 cases…but that’s “tested” cases. We’ve learned about that during our COVID adventure. Most people will recover at home without seeing a GP luckily.
Rates are 2.5 per 100,000 up from 0.5 per 100,000 a few years ago. It is an increase, but the overall numbers are still small. Anecdotally, the children with iGAS did not have tonsillitis, just a cough. The conflation of tonsillitis, scarlet fever, and iGAS in the media has been totally unhelpful.
The government policy is likely to have the same two-pronged strategy that they his behind during Covid – a combination herd immunity and let the bodies pile high.
My 10 year old daughter is currently on her third prescription of 10 day antibiotics due to Strep. Different antibiotics every time. She’s missed 45 days of school… We haven’t had an actual face to face app with a doctor, just a phone appointment, a throat swab left at reception and then a prescription. We’re currently living on the Isle of Wight and Strep A / Scarlett fever is rife. I’m really hoping my daughter can kick this before Christmas 🙁
All the government does is say “don’t worry, theres no shortage, no crisis”
They don’t actually do anything!
Seeing a lot of people claiming that lockdowns are to blame for this spread, with little acknowledgement that children have been re-integrating for a long time now and this is the first such outbreak.
I’d sooner blame the fact that we’re in a cost of living crisis. The fact that people can’t afford to eat properly & heat their homes is going to have a far bigger impact on children’s immune system than a lockdown 2 years ago..
I work for a local surgury dispensary and it bullshit what the government are saying about there being plenty of stock of Amoxacillin and other Antibiotics solutions. We can’t get any from the 4 leading biggest suppliers. Constantly out of stock. So having to send patients with very young children out on a hunt to the bigger pharmacies like boots and Tesco. Which we are now being told haven’t got any. It upsetting the parents and we are getting no end of angry patients who direct there anger at us. No wonder moral and staff are leaving at high rates.
I live in Australia and the ease at which I can get a GP appointment, face to face or over the phone, is a huge factor in my decision to never move back to the UK. We can go to any GP, not just one. Usually kids appointments are free and I’ve never had to wait for one. Our preferred GP also a paediatrician and his sticker game is strong.
A couple of years ago my son broke his leg. I carried him into the children’s hospital and within minutes he was in a bed, given pain relief and sent for X-ray. It’s honestly life changing not to have to worry about access to quick, quality medical care for your children.
Problem is people in UK failing to realise that universal healthcare is amongs the worst in Europe and in many cases NHS is worse than in many developing countries.
My pregnant wife self diagnosed with a skin infection at week 5
On NHS website it clearly says it can cause complications untreated before week 12
GP said they won’t see us as we just moved out of his zone, new gp wont see us because they need to receive all papers from previous gp.
GP also said, miscarriage quite common anyway…
NHS Won’t see us before GP diagnose.
In the end GP took 2 months to register us, then they said it was indeed Pityriasis rosea, NHS said, “well we passed 12 weeks and the baby healthy so we are good”
I’m glad my family health rely on luck.
I don’t want to trash British healthcare, but I’ve been to a few much poorer countries and never seen this level of incompetency / ignorance and of course probably a massive lack of financial support.
I don’t even go into cancer related statistics, but spoiler alert, we are on the bad end with both diagnosing it and treating it.
I am pretty sure at this point that on many cases those kids would survived with better care.
Last advice:if your loved one health is on the line and you feel neglected by doctors or healthcare “professionals” fight and scream and shout if needed, they won’t care if he/she dies, you do.
Just a question has there been any cases in Europe? Or just uk
There’s an antibiotic crisis somewhere down the road, regardless. Patients often fail to use them properly, not completing the course prescribed. There are only a finite number of them, & they’ve been misused long enough to run the risk of resistant strains appearing. One day, they’ll all be useless when we really do need them.
22 comments
Lockdown has indirectly made Children’s immune systems weaker
They haven’t been able to naturally get and recover from illnesses
Let’s learn from our mistakes
I wonder how many of the 15 were seen by a doctor but also failed by that doctor? Also did any of the parents attempt to get an appointment and we unable to?
Seems like they’re desperate to prescribe nothing if they give an appointment at all.
This needs proper leadership now. There’s two things that are important here…it’s low risk per cases, so stop terrifying everyone their kids will die AND despite all the big talk, we don’t have the antibiotics widely available like the government claim. I have several friends who are pharmacists and they can’t access these drugs. It’s being widely reported there aren’t enough.
This is why you need proper leadership to give clear advice and ensure it stops at 15. It is an easy cure with just some antibiotics, so this doesn’t need to be something scary or fatal
What I’m hearing from all this is that if you’re worried about your child having serious symptoms, and you can’t access a GP, go to A and E.
Of course they’re overwhelmed too. But what’s the alternative?
Currently a three week wait for a gp in our area, assuming you can even get thru on the phone. It may be different if the patient is a child. But still. If my child was worsening rapidly I’d be straight to A and E. And I bet other parents would be the same.
Almost like under funding your health service leads to people dying unnecessarily, including children.
[removed]
useful info here
https://ukhsa.blog.gov.uk/2022/12/05/group-a-strep-what-you-need-to-know/
Yesterday morning it was 6 dead over the last couple weeks.
By the end of yesterday it was 9.
And today its 15.
I’ll say exactly the same as I said in yesterday’s thread… Historically 1-2 children die of Strep A **over the entire winter period**. According to the MET office we aren’t even in Winter yet (starts 21st of December this year). To have lost 15 children **already** is totally unacceptable.
Yesterday I had someone telling me not be alarmist, saying that cases had “roughly” doubled. That last year we had 4 deaths of Strep A not 1-2, whilst at the same time saying we “couldn’t use last year’s data” when showing that it was closer to a tenfold increase, not the “roughly double” they sugggested.
We need action on this, now. Write to your MP’s and make a fuss, our children deserve better than this, especially after the sacrifices we have asked them to make recently.
Just to put some objectivity into this very sad trend.
There could easily be 100,000 cases (and probably more) active right now.
So that’s a death rate of 0.015% as the worst case scenario. Obviously the usual platitudes of “1 death is too many and tragic” apply, but that goes without saying.
Very scary for parents and im not sure what the answer is? As a government, I would NOT encourage antibiotics for all, as we don’t have them and it could cause some nasty strain-mutations. As a parent, I’d demand them at the slightest fever because they don’t offer rapid Strep test.
[According to scientists](https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ukhsa-update-on-scarlet-fever-and-invasive-group-a-strep), the issue isn’t that we’ve suddenly got more deadly Strep, just that a lot more people are catching it who’s immunity hasn’t built up properly thanks to Lockdowns and COVID measures.
EDIT: Yes the UKHSA have reported 900 cases…but that’s “tested” cases. We’ve learned about that during our COVID adventure. Most people will recover at home without seeing a GP luckily.
Rates are 2.5 per 100,000 up from 0.5 per 100,000 a few years ago. It is an increase, but the overall numbers are still small. Anecdotally, the children with iGAS did not have tonsillitis, just a cough. The conflation of tonsillitis, scarlet fever, and iGAS in the media has been totally unhelpful.
To put this into perspective, not as bad as 2018
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nationalworld.com/health/strep-a-how-many-cases-of-scarlet-fever-and-igas-have-there-been-in-2022-compared-to-2018-outbreak-3945727%3famp
The government policy is likely to have the same two-pronged strategy that they his behind during Covid – a combination herd immunity and let the bodies pile high.
My 10 year old daughter is currently on her third prescription of 10 day antibiotics due to Strep. Different antibiotics every time. She’s missed 45 days of school… We haven’t had an actual face to face app with a doctor, just a phone appointment, a throat swab left at reception and then a prescription. We’re currently living on the Isle of Wight and Strep A / Scarlett fever is rife. I’m really hoping my daughter can kick this before Christmas 🙁
[Here](http://www.whenshouldiworry.com/resources/When%20should%20I%20worry-Booklet_England-with%20111%20service_2016.pdf) is a helpful booklet called ‘When should I worry’ for parents that my GP often gives people
Where are the
Lock downstairs
Masks
Social distancing
Vaccines
Oh, they’re only kids…so no one cares!
All the government does is say “don’t worry, theres no shortage, no crisis”
They don’t actually do anything!
Seeing a lot of people claiming that lockdowns are to blame for this spread, with little acknowledgement that children have been re-integrating for a long time now and this is the first such outbreak.
I’d sooner blame the fact that we’re in a cost of living crisis. The fact that people can’t afford to eat properly & heat their homes is going to have a far bigger impact on children’s immune system than a lockdown 2 years ago..
I work for a local surgury dispensary and it bullshit what the government are saying about there being plenty of stock of Amoxacillin and other Antibiotics solutions. We can’t get any from the 4 leading biggest suppliers. Constantly out of stock. So having to send patients with very young children out on a hunt to the bigger pharmacies like boots and Tesco. Which we are now being told haven’t got any. It upsetting the parents and we are getting no end of angry patients who direct there anger at us. No wonder moral and staff are leaving at high rates.
I live in Australia and the ease at which I can get a GP appointment, face to face or over the phone, is a huge factor in my decision to never move back to the UK. We can go to any GP, not just one. Usually kids appointments are free and I’ve never had to wait for one. Our preferred GP also a paediatrician and his sticker game is strong.
A couple of years ago my son broke his leg. I carried him into the children’s hospital and within minutes he was in a bed, given pain relief and sent for X-ray. It’s honestly life changing not to have to worry about access to quick, quality medical care for your children.
Problem is people in UK failing to realise that universal healthcare is amongs the worst in Europe and in many cases NHS is worse than in many developing countries.
My pregnant wife self diagnosed with a skin infection at week 5
On NHS website it clearly says it can cause complications untreated before week 12
GP said they won’t see us as we just moved out of his zone, new gp wont see us because they need to receive all papers from previous gp.
GP also said, miscarriage quite common anyway…
NHS Won’t see us before GP diagnose.
In the end GP took 2 months to register us, then they said it was indeed Pityriasis rosea, NHS said, “well we passed 12 weeks and the baby healthy so we are good”
I’m glad my family health rely on luck.
I don’t want to trash British healthcare, but I’ve been to a few much poorer countries and never seen this level of incompetency / ignorance and of course probably a massive lack of financial support.
I don’t even go into cancer related statistics, but spoiler alert, we are on the bad end with both diagnosing it and treating it.
I am pretty sure at this point that on many cases those kids would survived with better care.
Last advice:if your loved one health is on the line and you feel neglected by doctors or healthcare “professionals” fight and scream and shout if needed, they won’t care if he/she dies, you do.
Just a question has there been any cases in Europe? Or just uk
There’s an antibiotic crisis somewhere down the road, regardless. Patients often fail to use them properly, not completing the course prescribed. There are only a finite number of them, & they’ve been misused long enough to run the risk of resistant strains appearing. One day, they’ll all be useless when we really do need them.