Students isolate after biology lesson leads to covid concerns

Friday 16 October 2020

A biology lesson designed to educate students on covid-19 testing descended into "confusion" after some of them produced false positive results.

A group of A-Level students at Blanchelande College, who tried out some new covid-19 tests in their biology lesson yesterday, were told to isolate while two students and a staff member were sent to the hospital for an official test.

The students were learning about immunology and were invited to use their own saliva sample to try out the tests, which are currently being used in parts of the UK and Europe, but not in Guernsey.

It's understood the antigen and antibody tests used in the lesson have a 20% chance of giving a false positive result - far higher than those being used by the local Public Health team.

After some "confusion in the data received", the school decided to isolate the group and contact Public Health for guidance.

Pictured: A class at Blanchelande was learning more about covid-19 testing. 

Since then, two students and one member of staff have been tested by HSC at the hospital. All of the results came back negative.

"While this exercise provided our students with a real-world experience of the latest technology available to screen populations for covid-19, we will certainly be reviewing our procedures, and are of course relieved that everyone is in good health and grateful to the staff at Public Health for their support this afternoon," the Principal, Robert O'Brien wrote to parents following the incident.

All parents of children at the school were notified via email, after the Public Health results came back. However, some have raised concerns about why they weren't told earlier.

"I'm not amused to find out hours after the event that this situation occurred," one parent told Express.