Pic of schools - PA REOPENINGS of schools next week may be delayed as part of measures to tackle soaring coronavirus case numbers, scientists advising the Government have suggested. School leaders have also warned that teachers and pupils may be put at risk if secondaries reopen, as planned, while a new ultra-transmissible strain of Covid-19 is driving a rise in hospital admissions. Earlier this month, the Government said exam-year students would go back to school as normal after the Christmas holidays, but the majority of secondary school pupils would start the term online to allow headteachers to roll out mass testing of children and staff.