A survey of 1,000 parents and 100 nursery heads conducted by the Childcare Recruitment Company in Manchester found that 28 per cent of parents also confessed to deliberately disguising signs of a child's contagious ear or eye infection.
Others said they had administered a dose of Calpol before dropping a child off to 'perk them up', or had not divulged that a child had diarrhoea.
All the nursery heads interviewed expressed concern about what they saw as a 'growing trend'.
Susan Fruhman, head of the Lillian Harris Day Nursery in Cheadle, Cheshire, said, 'Parents' attitudes can be quite irresponsible. If we do accept their ill child, it is not only other children who get sick but staff too. In the most severe cases this can lead to a nursery actually having to close.
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