the times | Thursday August 6 2020 2GM 9News
either because of other problems it
identified in testing. Officials said that
the Apple-Google model was unable to
differentiate between a phone in some-
one’s hand three metres away and a
phone that was in someone’s pocketthat was one metre away. “That is a
really important distinction if you’re
going to use the app to determine
whether or not you spend 14 days at
home,” one official said.
Northern Ireland last week launchedMinisters have been urged to consider
making secondary pupils wear face
coverings to ensure schools can return
next month without further restric-
tions on the nation’s freedom.
Labour and the children’s commis-
sioner for England have both said the
government should drop its opposition
to pupils in masks, as scientific advisers
warned that the full reopening of
secondary schools was likely to require
fresh restrictions elsewhere.
Boris Johnson has said the return of
all pupils is a “national priority” but
Neil Ferguson, of Imperial College
London, warned that this was likely to
cause infections to rise without the
imposition of other measures.
Nick Gibb, the schools minister, said
that all schools would reopen in Sep-
tember with strict social distancing
measures. “We’re very clear that all
children will be returning to school in
September, including in areas of local
lockdown such as Greater Manches-
ter,” he said.
Asked on Times Radio whether
schools should always stay open over
pubs and restaurants, Mr Gibb said any
decisions would be “more nuanced”.
He insisted that in the event of minor
outbreaks, local and central govern-
ment would agree measures to keep
schools open even if new restrictionsOlder pupils may cover
up when classes restart
were introduced for businesses and
households.
Professor Ferguson, who resigned
from the Scientific Advisory Group for
Emergencies after breaking lockdown
rules to see his married lover, said that
primary pupils posed little transmis-
sion risk. “I think the concern is with
secondary schools, teenagers, further
education colleges and universities
where the evidence is still not certain,
but it looks like older teenagers can
transmit just as well as adults,” he told
BBC Radio 4’s Toda y.
“The risk then is that big schools,
comprehensives, universities, FE col-
leges, link lots of households together,
reconnect the social network which
social distancing measures have delib-
erately disconnected.”
Anne Longfield, the children’s com-
missioner for England, said yesterday
that pubs and shops should be shut if
necessary to open schools, and masks
could also be an option. She told BBC
Breakfast: “I don’t think it’s something
that should be a blanket introduction as
yet unless the scientific advice is to do
so. But if it means schools stay open and
people have confidence, I wouldn’t
want to rule it out either.”
Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow
health secretary, said Labour would
accept “tough decisions” to ensure
schools reopened. He urged ministers
to improve the test and trace system.Chris Smyth, Patrick MaguireMost parents support the reopening of
schools next month in a reversal of
widespread anxiety in the early stages
of the pandemic, a poll has found.
The findings will reinforce calls on
ministers to prioritise sending children
back to school after Anne Longfield,
the children’s commissioner for
England, said it should come before
keeping pubs open if local or national
lockdowns return in the autumn.
A YouGov survey of 2,447 respon-
dents asked whether, as things stand,
schools should fully reopen after the
summer holidays. It found that 57 per
cent agreed, with 18 per cent undecided
and 25 per cent against.
Reluctance by parents to send in
children thwarted plans by ministers for
a gradual reopening of schools in En-
gland from mid-June, as many families
with pupils in reception, Year 1 and YearParents want schools to open
6 kept them at home for fear of exposing
them to the virus. Many key workers al-
so declined to send their children to
school during the lockdown even
though they were eligible to attend.
A second survey of 1,086 parents in
England by the website Mumsnet and
Starline, a home-learning support
service, found that 74 per cent of those
whose children had returned were
satisfied with arrangements at their
school to keep children safe and adapt
their learning. Confidence was highest,
at 83 per cent, among parents with
children in reception and fell to 56 per
cent of parents with children who are
due to sit GCSE exams next year.
Nick Gibb, the schools minister, said
the results of the survey were encour-
aging. “It is our priority to get all child-
ren back in the classroom in September
as it is the best place for children to be,
not only for their education but to be
with their fellow pupils and teachers.”Greg Hurst Social Affairs Editorits own track and tracing app based on
the Apple and Google model. It is com-
patible with an app already available in
the Republic of Ireland. The Scottish
government has said that it will launch
a similar app in autumn.
IAN GAVAN/GETTY IMAGESNews
to tell users their risk ratings
English testing chiefs now say that
giving personalised advice through the
app could be just as powerful in fighting
the virus as automated contact tracing.
At its most basic this will involve
telling people whether they are in an
area where infection rates are higher or
lower than average, and pilot schemes
will look at whether this will change the
way people behave.
There are plans to allow people to
enter personal information to be given
an individual risk score. For example a
75-year-old person who thinks they are
high risk because of their age might be
told they are relatively safe because they
are healthy, live in a rural area and do
not come into contact with many
people every day. However, a 50-year-
old south Asian taxi driver with diabetes
would be flagged as very high risk and
consideration is being given to allowingsuch people to order a test directly even
if they have no symptoms. “Many
people would welcome both the person-
al and geographical risk assessment, but
the place one would be simplest and
probably the most popular,” said a
source with knowledge of the plans.
Risk assessments will draw on the Blue-
tooth measurements of proximity even
while they are not exact enough to
guide decisions about isolating.
Officials believe that the signal does
not need to be so precise to give people
a rough count of how many times in a
day they have been within two metres
of someone for more than 15 minutes.
This would allow people to judge how
much risk they were willing to take
themselves, while also flagging up, for
example, days when they have many
more close contacts than usual.
Letters, page 26app’s success is heavily
qualified, with critics saying
manual contact tracers have
been as successful. Nearly
seven million Australians
have downloaded the app,
but the numbers are short
of the target of 40 per cent
of the 25 million population.
That target has since been
abandoned.Germany
The Corona-Warn-App,
based on the decentralised
Google-Apple model, has
been downloaded about
16.5 million times in a
population of 83 million
(Oliver Moody writes). By
mid-July about 500
Germans had used the app
to warn others that they hadtested positive. Because the
technology has no database,
the authorities cannot track
how many contacts who
receive warnings through
the system go on to test
positive themselves.United States
Contact tracing, like every
element of the pandemicresponse, is decentralised
(Henry Zeffman writes).
Some states have promoted
apps but usage has
generally failed to take off,
in part due to scepticism
about being monitored.
Instead much contact
tracing is manual, even in
New York, the state worst
affected by Covid-19.