Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish the data his Department holds on the effect of school bubble isolation following positive covid-19 cases on local covid-19 transmission rates.

Public Health England (PHE) in partnership with the Office for National Statistics and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, is working on a large prospective study in schools across England which aims to collect data on infection and transmission in primary and secondary schools. This will include detailed investigations of bubbles and outbreaks in educational settings which will begin next term.

The data are anticipated to be published as part of the COVID-19 Schools Infection Survey in the summer of 2021. More information on the survey is available at the following link:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/surveys/informationforhouseholdsandindividuals/householdandindividualsurveys/covid19schoolsinfectionsurveysis

Further information on the PHE studies relating to childhood COVID-19 is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/covid-19-paediatric-surveillance