A series of studies has cast doubt on the role of schools in spreading the coronavirus as governments across Europe weigh fresh restrictions to slow a second wave of infections.
Studies in Germany and Norway, as well as two reviews focusing on education globally, suggest a renewal of widespread school closures would have a limited effect on curbing Sars-Cov-2, the virus that causes Covid-19.
The findings are likely to bolster policymakers concerned that school closures would risk more students falling behind and limit the ability of parents to return to work.
“Normal operations must be kept going as long as possible,” Germany’s minister for families, Franziska Giffey, said last week, welcoming one study that suggested “day cares are not sources of infection, children are not sources of infection”.
The research comes at a time of growing fatigue among school leaders struggling to cope with the pressures caused by quarantining infected staff and students, and suspected cases. Official figures on Tuesday showed 46 per cent of English secondary schools had at least one pupil isolating because of potential contact with a coronavirus case in the classroom.
The German studies include an analysis published last week by the Institute of Labour Economics (ILE) in Bonn that found the number of new cases in the country had not increased when schools were reopened following the summer breaks.
Ingo Isphording, Marc Lipfert and Nico Pestel, the authors of the report, found the number of newly confirmed cases actually decreased gradually in German states that reopened schools, compared with those that did not. “This result certainly ran counter [to our expectations],” said Mr Isphording.
Germany has seen a steep rise in new infections in recent weeks but a survey of the education ministries in Germany’s 16 states by RND, a German media group, concluded there was no evidence that schools had become superspreaders.
The research found that since schools had reopened, only 0.04 per cent of pupils had become infected in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia — or 853 of about 2m pupils. Schleswig-Holstein and Bavaria also had a rate of 0.04 per cent, while Berlin’s was slightly higher at 0.07 per cent.
A Norwegian study found most cases reported in schools occurred among pupils infected at home © Ina Fassbender/AFP/Getty
The ILE researchers attributed the low infection levels in the German schools surveyed to strict hygiene measures, including mask wearing, teaching in small fixed groups and rapid testing and quarantining of classes where a student or teacher had tested positive.
Norway’s National Institute of Public Health said that between June and October, an analysis of the source of infections showed that most cases reported in its schools occurred among pupils infected by adults in their households rather than others at school.
An assessment of published research on school Covid-19 outbreaks around the world by academics at the UK’s Edinburgh University this month, which has not been peer reviewed, said the quality of evidence remained poor but that infection rates in schools were low overall, and lower among students than staff.
The findings reflect two reviews of available evidence conducted by the World Health Organisation and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, which concluded that most children do not develop symptoms and there is little evidence of transmission in schools.
However, the studies highlight the difficulty of identifying the precise transmission mechanisms for Sars-Cov-2.
Gwen Knight, an assistant professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, who is compiling a database of reports of “superspreader” outbreaks worldwide, said she had so far identified relatively few incidents within educational settings.
“Schools should be important given that so many networks come together [there]— with kids, parents and social life,” she said. “But the signal doesn’t seem to be very strong. We are finding it quite hard to find direct evidence of transmission within the school setting, but we are not doing enough testing.”
