GETTING schools back was always going to be one of the biggest challenges of the pandemic.

Not because it necessarily poses a major public health risk, but because the start of any new school term triggers a spike in cold and flu-like viruses that could easily be mistaken for Covid-19, thus precipitating exactly the surge in demand for testing that has occurred in recent weeks.

A glance at the latest statistics for Scotland shows that during the seven days to August 11 - when schools began re-opening - a total of 31,477 people in Scotland were newly tested for the virus. This resulted in 362 new cases being detected - a positivity rate of 1.2 per cent.

In the seven days to August 25, the number of people being tested had risen sharply to 49,345, with 514 new cases identified - a 1.1% positivity rate.

Many of these individuals will have been tested more than once; across the NHS and community sites we are now performing more than 100,000 Covid antigen tests per week - the highest turnover since the pandemic began.

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Despite this sudden upswing in demand - and bearing in mind that the vast majority of testing is carried out on individuals with possible Covid symptoms - 99% of those tested are still coming back negative for the Sars-CoV-2 virus.

While some of these may be false negatives, it is also a strong indicator of just how many non-Covid viral infections are circulating in the community causing coughs and fevers.

Young children have also long been known to be ‘superspreaders’ of colds and flu - yet the same does not appear to be true for the newest strain of coronavirus behind the pandemic.

Emerging evidence suggests that older children aged 12 and over can infect others with Covid in much the same way as adults, however, leading the World Health Organisation to update its guidance to advise that teenagers should wear facemasks in certain circumstances.

There is less concern about the danger of the virus to children and adolescents per se. The evidence is overwhelming that the age group is at extremely low risk of serious illness or complications.

The real alarm surrounds their potential to pass the infection on to adults on campus, or to bring it home to family members who may be a greater risk.

Yet even this is unclear.

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A Public Health England study published on Sunday analysed outbreaks linked to primary and pre-school children during June.

Of the million or so children attending, 70 children and 128 members of staff were infected in 30 separate outbreaks - but PHE said most had probably been caused by staff members infecting other staff members, with only two instances apparently linked to pupild infecting other pupils.

However, a study by French epidemiologist Arnaud Fontanet at a school in France found that although younger age groups do not "transmit to the same extent", "teenagers are just as contagious as adults".

Dr Simon Clarke, associate professor of cellular microbiology at the University of Reading, told the Independent that it was best to “err on the side of caution” when discussing whether the coronavirus can be transmitted to adults by children.

“There’s not a mountain of evidence on both sides," he said. "The fact is we know very little about this, precious little.”

The bottom line, however, is that our testing capacity has not kept pace with the predictable surge in demand caused by schools reopening.

The same pattern is occurring in countries such as South Korea, where schools in Seoul were forced to close and revert back to distance learning this week after the 12th consecutive day of triple-digit daily increases in coronavirus cases. At least 193 students and teachers have tested positive over the past two weeks in the Seoul city region.

Germany too was forced to completely or partially close some of its schools or quarantine pupils and teachers within days of the new term two weeks ago. In Berlin, 38 schools have been affected by Covid-19 cases.

The messaging in Scotland was clear: schools could only open safely as long as anyone with possible symptoms stayed home and got tested straightaway.

READ MORE: Contact tracing 'will only prevent outbreaks if testing carried out within 24 hours of symptoms'

Modelling by academics from University College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine predicted that reopening of schools in England in September could lead to a second, bigger wave of coronavirus by December unless a "comprehensive test, trace and isolate strategy" was in place. This took into account other factors - such as parents being freed up to return to offices (something the Scottish Government is continuing to advise against where possible) - but it illustrates the importance of sufficient and rapid testing capacity.

The fact that our testing capacity has been overwhelmed so quickly - even if some of it is confusion among people told to self-isolate wrongly seeking tests - is far from ideal.

On the plus side, the test results we do have so far indicate that Covid is only behind around one in every 100 cases of flu-like illness.