Councillors call for more support to help Hartlepool schools tackle Covid-19 pandemic

The latest statistics for Hartlepool show that in the week up to November 15th there were 581 confirmed cases – up from 369 cases the week before.

At the latest meeting of the Hartlepool Outbreak Control Engagement Working Group, officers highlighted there are some areas seeing a large concentration of Covid-19 cases, such as the border between Hart and De Bruce wards.

Cllr Brenda Harrison, speaking at the meeting, said she believes pupils going back in September would have had an impact on cases rising, and called for more support for schools.

She said: “I can’t see how the schools going back in September en masse as they did is not a contributory factor to that, there are a lot of schools in that area.

“l know schools are doing everything they can, this is absolutely no criticism of them.

“I just think they need more support in order to do things a little differently maybe and to actually still give the kids their education, still have that kind of social contact, but maybe not quite as full on as it is.”

She added schools are in need of a lot of support to help deal with the numbers of children from different households interacting.

Cllr Harrison said: “Particularly within the secondary schools, because you’ve got lots of children, lots of households there altogether, they can’t stay in a bubble, it’s ridiculous, those bubbles popped as soon as they went back into school.

“I do think that schools are struggling to maintain the sort of guidance that they’ve been given and to maintain the safety really, so I think they need a lot of support.”

Cllr Stephen Thomas had also previously questioned what could be driving the high rates of Covid-19 in certain areas, asking if it could be linked to schools or certain clusters of households.

Craig Blundred, Hartlepool’s acting director of public health, said they are following up the data around potential Covid-19 hotspots but nothing has ‘leapt out’ to date.

He said: “For that particular area there hasn’t been anything that’s leapt out at us that are key problems there.

“What you are seeing is in households, that there could be two or three households in an area and you would see the virus going through members of each household, which again isn’t unexpected.

“It could just be that it’s related to a higher number of households that have got the infection and then that household if it has a higher number of people within it will experience cases there.”

He added it is also safe to say it has reached the point where ‘general transmission’ is happening in the population.

Mr Blundred reiterated it is vital residents continue to wash their hands frequently, wear a face covering and keep their distance, to help reduce the spread of the virus.

He also stressed the importance of residents getting tested if they show any symptoms and following any self-isolation guidance.

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