'Enhanced' Covid measures in place at these six Suffolk schools

The council announced last week that it would be asking schools to send siblings of Covid positive pupils home where it was concerned about the number of cases.

Public Health Suffolk recommended that any siblings of children aged four to 18, unless exempt, who have tested positive for Covid-19, must now stay at home for three days.

After the third day, any siblings that live at the same address as the positive child can get a PCR test. If the test comes back negative, and they are not showing Covid symptoms, the siblings can return to school.

The measures were only put in place at schools where the council deemed it necessary in order to break the chain of transmission.

There were limited exemptions in place; most notably for pupils who have had at least one dose of the vaccine more than 14 days ago.

At the time, the council said that only one school in the county had been asked to operate in this way but did not clarify at the time which school it was.

It confirmed on Monday that six schools were now under these new measures across the county.

The following schools are currently under the enhanced measures: Kesgrave High School, East Point Academy in Lowestoft, St Mary's Church of England School in Hadleigh, East Bergholt High School, Thurston Community College and St Albans in Ipswich.

Suffolk County Council's testing team were at Kesgrave High School on Monday to drop off PCR tests for the entire school to take as an extra precautionary measure.

The council confirmed that no other schools in Suffolk were currently taking this particular measure.

The news comes after Covid increases in parts of Ipswich in recent weeks were attributed to growing numbers of cases among school children.

Growth in areas like Stoke Park and Belstead Hills, which saw the highest Covid rate of any district in county since the start of the pandemic, was directly linked to high case numbers in schools including East Bergholt High School.