Mr Wilbee has not contacted his family since he disappeared

Police say Alastair Wilbee left his home in Shanklin, Isle of Wight, on 28 August in a distressed state, and has not contacted his family since.

His wife Gail said she feared the worst for her husband, and criticised the way his name was published.

Mr Wilbee, 47, head at Summerfield Primary School, Newport, Isle of Wight, has emphatically denied the sexual assault charge.

He was suspended from his post at the school in May, shortly after the allegation was first made.

I watched the news about the Kelly inquiry, about the words of the suicide experts and I watched my husband go through those same stages Mrs Gail Wilbee

He went missing the day before a local newspaper was due to publish a report of his first court appearance.

Mrs Wilbee, also a teacher, said: "His deep grief at the waste of his professional life and the loss of standing in the community that he saw as the inevitable result of the publication of his name and address... have placed my family and I in the current traumatic and possibly tragic situation."

She compared his situation to that of the weapons expert David Kelly: "I watched the news about the Kelly inquiry, about the words of the suicide experts and I watched my husband go through those same stages of loss, grief, not anger but powerlessness.

"My husband's suffering has highlighted the vulnerability of professionals working with children."

She described him as a caring family man and said she and their two teenage children were desperate for him to return.

Mrs Wilbee said she intended to fight for changing the process in which the details of childcare professionals are released to the press in such circumstances.

A police spokesman said a thorough search of specific areas of the island had been carried out with a spotter plane and tracker dogs but that it had been scaled down until further information was available.