‘I’ve got some extra lines in the production – one of the cast is off with Covid-19!’ texted my 11-year-old from her school drama rehearsal.

My personal alert system, which had been humming softly since the return to school in September, had ramped up in volume a few weeks ago as cases started to rise in my daughter’s school – and it kicked into hypervigilant mode in response to this message. The show must go on, but would it?

It had become clear that all Covid-19 had to do was idly flick its finger, and down went the children like dominoes. But little did I appreciate then how it would stamp on the adults. 

It appears that many families have been dragged into a game of Covid-19 roulette. While it finally seems to be registering with the Government that schools are a hub for the recent spike in infections, it seems to ignore the knock-on effect for parents who are now being clobbered with the disease. I know because I’m one of them.

It was common knowledge that coronavirus was ripping its way through school and parents attending the school production were asked to wear masks. A sensible request. Hardly an imposition. However, when I rocked up in mine, I was shocked to feel like the odd one out.

A quick sweep of a packed, unventilated hall revealed a maskless majority, laughing in each other’s faces, leaning in close to gossip – in a place that was as far as you could get from a Covid-free zone. 

I was confused. Had I missed a parents’ WhatsApp message about a mask rebellion? For the few hours I was there, I felt as though I might as well have smeared myself with the contents of a petri-dish.

Three days after the show, my daughter woke up complaining of having had a restless night and saying that it hurt to move her head. Immediately, we were concerned that she might have caught Covid – not wanting to miss school, she had taken two lateral flow tests to be sure.

A howl outside my bedroom door had announced the first positive test.

Fortunately for her, symptoms were mild: nausea, fatigue and a headache. What was harder was keeping her spirits up.

Typically, there was a cluster of social events around this time and, although I was under no obligation to self-isolate having had both vaccinations and having repeatedly tested negative, it didn’t feel right.

When I told my friends the situation, responses ranged from thanking me for being considerate and ‘yes, please stay away,’ to entreating me to join them if I was still testing negative. 

It felt nonsensical that Covid was in my house, that I had been hugging my daughter before she tested positive, yet I was within my rights to sit next to someone in a restaurant or go on public transport without a mask.

For parents and teachers, the return to school in September was always a potential flashpoint yet it seemed to fall off the Government’s radar. A blind faith that everyone would do the right thing hasn’t played out that well of late.

A couple of days after my daughter tested positive for Covid, both my husband and I started to feel ill but we were sure we had fallen prey to the ‘super cold’ – the lurgy that seems to be riding happily in the sidecar to Covid. We had received our second dose of the vaccine in May and had come through unscathed from our son contracting Covid in July – it had to be that.

The same day I started feeling ill, I happened to be interviewing teachers on Zoom who were dotted around the country for a piece I was writing. Coughing my way through my questions, I discovered that many of them were isolating, having been struck down as Covid raged through their schools.

As I sat watching Bake Off later that evening, wrapped up in multiple layers, shivering uncontrollably – and finding the usually enticing bakes unusually stomach-churning – I received a text from a friend whose daughter is at school with mine, and who was also off with Covid. Both she and her husband had tested positive from what they thought was a ‘heavy cold.’

That ‘cold’ turned out to be Covid for us too. When we received the results of our PCR tests, bizarrely, mine was negative despite my husband and I experiencing identical symptoms and him testing positive.

I immediately took another lateral flow test: positive. I ordered a further PCR test which, this time, came back positive.

It then transpired that many of my friends with children at school had also come down with the virus. Having spent the last 18 months being vigilant, sensible and getting vaccinated, everything was grinding to a halt for them.

The general perception that this was confined to children, that the effects were mild, didn’t accord with the reality I was experiencing and hearing about. It feels like it doesn’t really matter what is happening to families with their lives on hold, provided the pubs remain open. Instead of your children bringing home their latest school project, they’re bringing home Covid.

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For many of us, it isn’t just like having a cold. Both my husband and I were taken out at the same time and were unable to function for days on end. Unable to work and unable to look after our children. 

Fortunately for us, our kids are older and they were able to help and run errands, but I cannot imagine what it would be like for parents with babies or toddlers, and no family nearby. The crushing fatigue still hasn’t left us almost three weeks after testing positive. In an effort to try and do something fun for half term, my husband took the children out for the day – but it took so much out of him that he then had to spend the next day in bed. 

In blithely letting Covid rip its way through schools, the Government doesn’t seem to have considered the impact it’s having on parents and grandparents, and the associated risks of long Covid.

I haven’t relished being part of what feels like a national experiment – the feeling we’re expendable while being expected to contribute to the economy, look after the older generation and raise the next. While the Government dithers yet again, many are suffering. 

The Government is relying on people to do ‘the right thing.’ But if parents in a school hall can’t be bothered to wear a mask, I don’t hold out much hope. 

As schools return from the holiday, it’s time for the Government to do the right thing: bring back mask wearing and ramp up the vaccination programme for children.

At least some are taking the issue seriously. On Friday, I received an email from my son’s school notifying parents that, owing to the rise in cases, they were implementing further measures for the return. This includes all pupils going back to wearing masks when moving around inside school.

For those students doing their GCSES, they will be in a bubble, testing daily and wearing masks in lessons to minimise further disruption.

Having experienced the debilitating effects of Covid first-hand in parallel with my husband, I’m surprised at the blasé approach adopted by many.

In the absence of any clear direction or action from the Government, we do need to do the right thing. Parents, if a school requests you to wear masks, the very least you can do is comply. 

If we remind ourselves of the fiasco around last Christmas, a few measures now could save more draconian action later.

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