Peel Health has issued guidelines to parents instructing them to keep any children who have been sent home because a classmate has tested positive for COVID-19 isolated in a separate room from all other family members for 14 days.
The severe guidelines, which apply even to small children who are dismissed from child care, are being criticized by experts as harmful and not supported by science.
“This is cruel punishment for a child, especially for younger children, 4-10 years old,” Dr. Susan Richardson, a microbiologist and infectious disease physician who is also a professor emerita at University of Toronto, wrote in an email to the Sun.
“Shutting a child off from their parents and siblings for up to 14 days in this manner could produce significant and long-lasting emotional and psychological effects.”
The handout distributed at Peel Region schools explains, “If your child does not have any symptoms: the child must self-isolate, which means stay in a separate room, eat in a separate room apart from others, use a separate bathroom if possible.”
“This does not seem practically possible and is highly likely to cause harm to children who would already be experiencing considerable distress with having to remain at home,” Dr. Tess Clifford, the director of the Psychology Clinic at Queen’s University, said in an email to the Sun.
Clifford said those making decisions about pandemic mitigation measures need to consider the well-being of children across multiple domains of health.
“I don’t understand how any health-care professional has moved so far away from the fundamentals of public health and of doing no harm that they would think that basically incarcerating a child in a room for 14 days is in any way justified,” said Dr. Martha Fulford, an infectious diseases physician at Hamilton Health Science who focuses on pediatrics.
“This is shocking,” adds Fulford, “especially when you consider this is being proposed for children who are not in any way sick.”
The handout began appearing on social media in recent days as Peel residents balked at receiving it. The Sun confirmed the authenticity of the document with Peel Health, although it is also posted on their website.
“Sounds like child abuse to me. There’s a $5K fine for non-compliance.”
Dr. Richardson said in addition to the policy being harmful, it is not supported by science.
“An asymptomatic child in a classroom with one child testing positive is at very low risk for acquiring infection,” she says. “Most importantly, we are losing sight of the fact that if he/she should contract COVID while quarantining at home, they and their siblings are at an extremely low risk of suffering severe disease as a consequence.”
Pediatricians across Canada have previously noted that while COVID-19 is very serious in some categories of people, it does not pose a risk for serious outcomes in children.