A SPECIAL response team is ready to work with schools and colleges in Blackburn with Darwen if they have an outbreak of coronavirus and if necessary reintroduce face masks.

It was revealed by borough education boss Cllr Julie Gunn as she acknowledged Covid-19 case rates among students were rising.

She said while Blackburn with Darwen’s overall rate of at 231.3 cases per 100,000 people was the lowest in Lancashire, the age group with the highest level in the borough was 12 to 15-year-olds.

Cllr Gunn said: “Our Education Response Team is working closely with schools and colleges to support them to respond quickly to reports of positive cases.

“The team is also closely monitoring case rates in secondary schools and colleges to help identify clusters of infections or larger outbreaks.

“It will work with headteachers to put in place any necessary additional measures to prevent further transmission within the education setting.

“This could be the reintroduction of face coverings for a short period, for example.”

Blackburn with Darwen’s public health director Professor Dominic Harrison welcomed the vaccination of 12 to 15-year-olds as ‘good news’.

He said: “We did anticipate increases in our Covid case rates among children and young people in education.

“Cases early in the school year would have been transmitted by asymptomatic children who returned to school with the virus, having become infected in late summer through household or community transmission.

“As children are mixing in education settings again, and with many schools and colleges removing restrictions that kept year groups separate, it is inevitable that coronavirus will spread.

“With 23 per cent of Blackburn with Darwen residents under the age of 16 years - the eighth youngest population in all areas of England – it’s important to vaccinate 12 to 15s.

“Given what we know about the likely continuing spread of the virus over winter, it is highly likely that most young people will be exposed to Covid infection at some point in the coming months.

“Vaccinating this age group will help prevent further spread of coronavirus through our schools and also through household transmission, preventing more infections and possibly also avoidable deaths.”