Top Virologist Dr Yong Says COVID Should Not Keep Students From School

[webfact]

 

by Natthaphon Sangpolsit

    

BANGKOK (NNT) - Thailand’s top virology expert has said children with COVID-19 should not be absent from school for too long given expanding vaccination coverage and the nature of the Omicron coronavirus variant, which is far less virulent than previous strains.

 

Dr Yong Poovorawan, head of the Center for Excellence in Clinical Virology at the Faculty of Medicine of Chulalongkorn University, recently suggested a shorter self-isolation time for COVID patients, especially children.

 

He said in his Facebook post that the majority of people now have some level of immunity against COVID-19, either from vaccinations, infection or a hybrid immunity from both the vaccine and contracting the virus.

 

Dr Yong also said patients should self-isolate for seven days and avoid transmitting the virus to others by wearing a mask and frequently washing their hands.

 

Concerning children who exhibit mild symptoms, Dr Yong said they should stay home to recover and be allowed to return to school two days after symptoms subside.

 

He added that children over the age of 2 usually develop a robust immune response against the virus. There are currently no approved COVID-19 vaccines for kids under the age of 5 in Thailand.

 

Dr Yong meanwhile suggested that children who test positive opt to join online classes for a period of seven days, especially those with mild symptoms.

 

-- © Copyright NNT 2022-06-11

 

- Cigna offers a range of visa-compliant plans that meet the minimum requirement of medical treatment, including COVID-19, up to THB 3m. For more information on all expat health insurance plans click here.

 

Easiest way to own or rent a car in Thailand - click here to find out more!

:

[ThailandRyan]

Guess it is considered endemic now, and will be passed along in classes, like the common cold, the Flu and of course chickenpox  ...

[hotchilli]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Thailand’s top virology expert has said children with COVID-19 should not be absent from school for too long given expanding vaccination coverage and the nature of the Omicron coronavirus variant, which is far less virulent than previous strains.

Pure genius.

[Harveyboy]

Oh no that means the teachers have to work for the money ive still been paying for my kids to stay home eh 

[dinsdale]

7 hours ago, webfact said:

Dr Yong also said patients should self-isolate for seven days and avoid transmitting the virus to others by wearing a mask and frequently washing their hands.

Not sure how frequent washing of hands does anything at all in stopping the spread of an airborne virus. Love to see the science behind this from ....

7 hours ago, webfact said:

Thailand’s top virology expert

It is aerolised. You breathe it in. Having clean hands does what?

Edited June 13, 2022 by dinsdale

[spidermike007]

6 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

Not sure how frequent washing of hands does anything at all in stopping the spread of an airborne virus. Love to see the science behind this from ....

It is aerolised. You breathe it in. Having clean hands does what?

It has never be proved to be aerolised. Never. And you can get it from the hands, easily. It has been proven to come from droplets, not aerosol. 

[dinsdale]

10 minutes ago, spidermike007 said:

It has never be proved to be aerolised. Never. And you can get it from the hands, easily. It has been proven to come from droplets, not aerosol. 

As 2021 drew to a close, the highly contagious Omicron variant of the pandemic virus was racing around the globe, forcing governments to take drastic actions once again. The Netherlands ordered most businesses to close on 19 December, Ireland set curfews and many countries imposed travel bans in the hope of taming the tsunami of COVID-19 cases filling hospitals. Amid the wave of desperate news around the year-end holidays, one group of researchers hailed a development that had seemed as though it might never arrive. On 23 December, the World Health Organization (WHO) uttered the one word it had previously seemed incapable of applying to the virus SARS-CoV-2: ‘airborne’.

It took until 20 October 2020 for the agency to acknowledge that aerosols — tiny specks of fluid — can transmit the virus, but the WHO said this was a concern only in specific settings, such as indoor, crowded and inadequately ventilated spaces. Over the next six months, the agency gradually altered its advice to say that aerosols could carry the virus for more than a metre and remain in the air (see ‘Changing views of how COVID spreads’).

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00925-7

[jacko45k]

30 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

Not sure how frequent washing of hands does anything at all in stopping the spread of an airborne virus. Love to see the science behind this from ....

It is aerolised. You breathe it in. Having clean hands does what?

The virus does survive on surfaces and can be picked up by touching those surfaces. People do then touch their faces and mouths often by habit. I would not dismiss the idea of cleaning one's hands completely.

[dinsdale]

9 minutes ago, jacko45k said:

The virus does survive on surfaces and can be picked up by touching those surfaces. People do then touch their faces and mouths often by habit. I would not dismiss the idea of cleaning one's hands completely.

True but you'll need to clean your hands a lot in a country where people pull masks down to sneeze as they think masks are for protection from others rather than protecting others. 

[spidermike007]

4 hours ago, dinsdale said:

As 2021 drew to a close, the highly contagious Omicron variant of the pandemic virus was racing around the globe, forcing governments to take drastic actions once again. The Netherlands ordered most businesses to close on 19 December, Ireland set curfews and many countries imposed travel bans in the hope of taming the tsunami of COVID-19 cases filling hospitals. Amid the wave of desperate news around the year-end holidays, one group of researchers hailed a development that had seemed as though it might never arrive. On 23 December, the World Health Organization (WHO) uttered the one word it had previously seemed incapable of applying to the virus SARS-CoV-2: ‘airborne’.

It took until 20 October 2020 for the agency to acknowledge that aerosols — tiny specks of fluid — can transmit the virus, but the WHO said this was a concern only in specific settings, such as indoor, crowded and inadequately ventilated spaces. Over the next six months, the agency gradually altered its advice to say that aerosols could carry the virus for more than a metre and remain in the air (see ‘Changing views of how COVID spreads’).

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00925-7

A large part of this debate, whether it is an aerosol or not, is the safety of being outdoors, without a mask. Especially here, in mask obsessed Thailand. It does appear the risk outdoors is incredibly low. Especially now, with nationwide cases under 3,000 per day. They promised the mask mandate would be lifted June 15th, then they changed their minds. That is on them, not me. I will not be wearing a mask outdoors, starting on the 15th. Period. Enough is enough. 

 

Studies conducted prior to omicron show that being outside greatly reduces your risk of infection with the coronavirus. One review of studies concluded that the odds of indoor transmission is almost 19 times higher than outdoor transmission. And in a study of 64 college football games during the 2020 season involving 1,190 athletes, researchers at Texas A&M University found zero spread of COVID during game play based on three postgame PCR tests over the course of a week — likely because of the outdoor setting and short duration of close contact, experts say. 

 

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/01/21/1069904184/omicron-outdoor-transmission-risk

 

 

[paulikens]

covid shouldn't have stopped kids going to school from the start.   outrageous to shut the schools in the first place.  how that ever happened blows my mind. complete madness.