The Coronavirus pandemic has devastated the whole world. Although vaccination of the adult population is going on for some time, no vaccine is available for children(0-18 years). As the vast population of young children is still vulnerable to covid 19 (and there is a possibility of a third wave of covid 19) it is important to know the disease severity in children.
The seriousness of a disease can be judged by mortality rates(% of diagnosed people died) or hospitalization rates(% of diagnosed people hospitalized)
let’s see the available data :
In US(data available on 20/5/2021)
Children represent 14.1% of total covid cases but only 0.00%-0.20% of covid deaths( few states have zero covid deaths in children till now). Children also account for only 1.3%-3.2% of the hospitalized patient.
Overall mortality in covid 19 in the US is 1.78% but in children, it is 0.00%-0.03%.
When I go through statistics from other countries, they show a similar trend in children.
[Large-scale data on Indian children is not available while writing this post.]
Hence, it appears that severe illness due to covid 19 in children is a rare possibility.
It does not mean that no child will get a serious covid 19 infection or get hospitalized. Risk factors for hospital admission are
- children with less than 3 month age or
- with comorbidity like
- chronic kidney disease,
- congenital heart disease,
- chronic lung disease(like asthma),
- diabetes,
- obesity
- chronic neurological disease etc.
So, don’t get alarmed if your child gets covid positive. Most likely he will overcome the disease without much trouble.
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