A member of staff at a secondary school has tested positive for Covid-19.

The case of coronavirus was reported at Westlands School in Sittingbourne yesterday, and as a result the infected individual and one other member of staff who had been in close contact with them are now self-isolating for 14 days.

News of the positive test for the virus was communicated to parents in a letter from the school, along with details of a special hotline set up to allow any further cases of infection to be reported directly to the school.

Head teacher Christina Honess said: "We are following all advice from Public Health England and the Department for Education and are responding very quickly.

"We have also set up an out-of-hours Covid line so that if anyone tests positive we can find out immediately."

The school remains open as usual and students should attend as normal if they are well and do not show any symptoms of the coronavirus.

Yesterday's confirmed case is just the latest positive result at a school in the town, with a number of other outbreaks of varying size reported since pupils and staff returned to classrooms at the end of the summer.

On October 3 parents of pupils at The Sittingbourne School, formerly Sittingbourne Community College, were informed of a confirmed case in a pupil in Year 7 .

His class and all those who travelled to the Swanstree Avenue site on the same bus from Sheppey on the morning of September 29 were told to self isolate.

A full list of schools that have been affected by coronavirus since reopening in September can be found here

Read more: All the latest news from Sittingbourne