Throughout my life I've always looked forward to Friday and not Monday.

Did I imagine the influenza vaccine I had last year then?

Gilbert at Oxford says 80% chance of a vaccine by September. Which is it?

Err - well, if you think we're going to see circa 3500 cases a day, every day, from now until September then I can see why you asked the question.

If you don't think that, the answer's pretty obvious!

(And FWIW, we won't be seeing 3500 cases a day for the next 3½ months. The idea is that as the number of cases fall, restrictions can be eased. As it stands, and as I said earlier, with things as they are opening schools fully is impossible. Hopefully by September cases will have fallen enough that things can get back to some semblance of normality, or at least there'll perhaps be a lowering of the 2m distance, such that all the children can actually physically attend school!)

80% confidence that an effective vaccine would be found and that it could be by September. Although since then has scaled that back to “very optimistic”. Time will tell.

Hasn't Sarah Gilbert in the past developed or helped to develop a number of vaccines against other diseases?

Only my view, but I am pretty sure she would not have been making the comments that she has made to the press in recent weeks about the chances of getting a vaccine by the time she speaks of unless she and those that work with her were all fairly confident that their vaccine will be the real deal.

I thought you were chomping at the bit to get back to work?

Did your negative antibody test change your mind?

Brexit has finally got to you.

I've never not been at work, as luckily my job is 95% doable from home anyway. I've been working my usual 8-to-4 hours, as have my team.

And no, the only thing I'm chomping at the bit to get back to is the wolves - I honestly don't miss the queues in the afternoon rush, the merging at the roundabout with pushy Londoners in the summer, the parents cluttering up the road to the school in their massive 4-by-4s, the getting to work 2 hours early just to avoid the morning rush hour and get a parking space, the constant interruptions when doing something that requires a lot of concentration...

The job itself is fine, but losing the bits around it makes me realise just how much time is wasted each day. I'd rather waste it at home than on the road!

So the Daily Heil finds one Doctor who disagrees with the BMA as proof that the advice is rubbish.

Just the same tactic as finding a Single Parent with 8 kids living in a Council house as proof the benefits system is a joke. A tabloid tactic for generations 

If it was safe to open schools, why aren't Eton, Harrow and most other private schools opening then?

Why aren't you allowed to see them? I thought Boris has given the green light to travel anywhere to exercise etc

I've been out of the conversation on schools despite a background in education. From a persnal point of view, as someone who would have to organise the logistics, I would g=have wanted to defer the return as long as possible!

But here goes  - IMO

The return on June 1st is being planned far more with a parental return to work in mind than with education of children. Only half a class can be accommodated inside a classroom, and there's no guarantee that the weather will alow outside classes, nor that parents will send their children back anyway. A lot of disorganisation will be inevitable, learning will be patchy and online teaching will become perfunctory as teachers will be occupied full-time in school. I'm not convinced that the cause of education will be advanced.

The return will be good for the children early years where attending school has a major social function as part of the education. In older years and outside families who value education, there will also have been an educational deficit (I speak from experience in trying some years ago to support an inner city project for such). So school opening is good for them, too, in principle. But institute compulsory attendance for anyone unable or unwilling to complete Internet assignments?

School re-opening is not good for teachers. There's been minimal discussion of PPE protection and with self-isolation regulations still in force there will be regular staff absences and classes sent home for lack of cover. Under existing legislation schools (or any other employer) who fails to provide safety at work is committing a criminal offence. Nor is re-opening good for parents with serious health issues when their children bring Covid home.

The unions have been somewhat hysterical, though I can't think of any other way in which this government might be persuaded to listen. They and the government need to concentrate on criteria which will enable schools to open instead of trading insults which have varied from smug to wild. Wait for the reaction when the first teacher after resumption dies of Covid, though! 

Comparisons with other countries are useful up to a point. The UK went into lockdown some weeks after other countries so we shouldn't expect to open as quickly as some have done. And because lockdown was late, our situation is worse than countries which acted promptly. Denmark has been quoted above as an example of successful re-opening; bi=ut taking figures from previous posts, they re-opened with 10 deaths/day in a population of 6m; that scales to 100 deaths per day in a population of approx 60m - last time I heard a figure the UK death rate was 468 per day.

So if I had to decide as a government minister, I'd actually talk to teachers and their representatives about specific criteria, aim at a re-opening in stages by age and location, think that I was doing well if a significant number of schools had re-opened this term, and resist pressure from the Cabinet Office to go any faster.

Me too, but since I gave up work, everyday is Friday and every evening is happy hour

Awkward realities and questions - the MMs of this world are great at avoiding them, their dogma tells them how to.