7 ms·

No it's not. There's still no evidence that there is any real risk to children. Please prove otherwise. Anecdotes and one in a million cases don't count.

jcrben 5y ago
Nearly 300 hospitalized per day, nearly 500 dead so far. https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/07/health/children-covid-19-protection/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/07/health/children-covid-19-prot... Unknown how many will long-term health effects. Even seemingly innocuous viruses like Epstein-Barr are tied to various health problems later in life. Why should we knowingly expose an entire generation to a little understood virus?
- colordrops 5y ago
  So less than one in a million children hospitalized per day. And 500 dead after almost two years is nothing, sorry to be so blunt. You can say epstein-barr, I can say other corona viruses like the cold virus. You can't just choose an arbitrary virus to compare to. We need strong evidence of serious risk to impose such restrictions, and not ungrounded fear which is not backed by data.
  - Aa9C4xPz43Gg7k6 5y ago
    Fear mongers run out of ammunition for forever lockdowns. Low quality of arguments will be compensated by hysteria and insults. For instance that you don't care about children (while in their age group it's less harmful than a flu).
    - Gibbon1 5y ago
      Two things. Vaccines got full approval today. And with it the powers that be's patience with people with your view point it as and end. And We're about 5-6 weeks away from vaccines to be approved for children 5-11 years old. With that the hammers going to come down on people whose argument for prolonging this is 'I don't wanna'
      - colordrops 5y ago
        Supporting vaccinations and supporting lockdowns are separate. You can support one and not the other.
- MatteoFrigo 5y ago
  CNN is fake news. Stop spreading misinformation. Raw mortality data at https://euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ https://euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ show no discernible increase in mortality for children 0-14 in England (or anywhere else for that matter).
- nkohari 5y ago
  Influenza kills thousands of people under 18 every year: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html We are actually _incredibly_ fortunate that Covid spares children to the degree that it does.
  - throwaway169169 5y ago
    > Influenza kills thousands of people under 18 every year: No, it does not. You didn't actually look at the numbers. One of the worst years overall shows 115 for 0-4 and 528 for 5-17: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm There are some years where the total is a little over a thousand, but most are well below. Don't spread this bull.
    - qweqwweqwe-90i 5y ago
      So looks like more kids were hospitalized and more died from the flu? What bull are you referring to? Were you outraged about them in any of the last 20 years?
      - throwaway169169 5y ago
        > What bull are you referring to? The bull that was clearly quoted? "Influenza kills thousands of people under 18 every year". The linked data does not say that at all. You're being difficult just to be difficult here.
    - nkohari 5y ago
      With apologies, I'll correct myself: flu kills hundreds, sometimes thousands of children per year. My point still stands, though: an equal or greater number of people under 18 are lost every year to influenza than have been lost to Covid. It's important to keep that in perspective, is all I'm saying.
      - dragonwriter 5y ago
        > My point still stands, though: an equal or greater number of people under 18 are lost every year to influenza than have been lost to Covid. This is false if you include the period during which COVID-19 has been around in “every year”, because COVID countermeasures also suppress the flu. Without COVID countermeasures, and without vaccination for most kids, COVID would kill far more than the flu normally does. Now, the COVID vaccine right now is more effective than the flu vaccine usually is (but that may be temporary if COVID is endemic and different variants proliferate), so with vaccines available to younger kids than now that might get evened out or reverse, but right now COVID is clearly far more deadly to kids.
luffapi 5y ago
There are risks to all of us when we let millions of children act as a breeding and mutation substrate for the virus. I would think that would be blinding obvious to anyone with even a basic grasp of biology. It’s also completely unknown what the long term effects of the virus are. Edit: Disappointed but not surprised by the amount of anti-science on this site. I feel like a lot of people have let politics destroy their ability to think critically to the point of near suicidal ignorance. Sad.
- FridayoLeary 5y ago
  >It’s also completely unknown what the long term effects of the virus are. Long term beyond a year and a half? I think it's safe to assume there is very little.
- hcurtiss 5y ago
  Given global vaccination rates, it will have abundant and plentiful opportunities for breeding and mutation forever. There is no vaccinating the entire globe for coronavirus. Certainly not in our lifetimes. And not given the declining effectiveness of the vaccines.
  - luffapi 5y ago
    I agree that the whole globe will not be vaccinated and that will continue to be a problem. That doesn’t negate what I said though, unvaccinated children are a huge part of that problem. > And not given the low effectiveness of the vaccines. I have no idea what this means. It sounds like you’re under false impressions. The vaccines are quite effective.
    - hcurtiss 5y ago
      I meant “declining.” Revised simultaneous with your comment. If the vaccine immunity does not persist and requires boosters, we will never reach global here immunity. The parent article is on point.
  - x1ph0z 5y ago
laputan_machine 5y ago
It's not about children getting it and being ill, it's about children getting it and spreading it. This is the concept behind 'herd immunity'. If we can cut the chain, we mitigate older and people with weakened immune systems from getting it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herd_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herd_immunity
- Expirat 5y ago
  > It's not about children getting it and being ill, it's about children getting it and spreading it. Vaccinated people can still get ill and spread it so why do you keep pushing vaccines to children who have no risk whatsoever if the vulnerable groups have been vaccinated and are safe??
- cm2187 5y ago
  But if vaccinated people are also spreading it, I don't get the point of waiting for kids to be vaccinated. The population at risk being vaccinated was the big deal, but that's done now (apart from those who refuse to be vaccinated, but then it is their problem).
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    > Bit if vaccinated people are also spreading it They are less likely to be infected, and it looks like they have a shorter infectious period. Herd immunity may be achievable with this in mind, but no one really knows right now. New variants may change the calculus too.
    - nradov 5y ago
      The Delta variant is contagious enough that we'll never achieve a level of herd immunity sufficient to protect unvaccinated people. All of us will be infected eventually, it's basically inevitable. Fortunately the vaccines are very effective at preventing deaths. https://www.businessinsider.com/delta-variant-made-herd-immunity-not-possible-astrazeneca-developer-2021-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/delta-variant-made-herd-immu...
brown9-2 5y ago
If you want to talk about “real risk” then I think it’s only fair to ask you to define what that acceptable risk level is.
- colordrops 5y ago
  It's the job of those imposing restrictions to define the risk.
- Thiez 5y ago
  Almost 4000 children die each year from drowning in the USA, with double that having a non-fatal drowning [0]. Note that non-fatal drownings can cause long-term health problems. They haven't banned pools yet, so it follows that, as a country, the USA considers 4000 dead children an acceptable risk of having open water, such as rivers, ponds, and pools. And bath tubs, I suppose. Now with that number in mind, how many children are expected to die if all of them were to be infected with covid-19? I found it hard to find some numbers about this, in my country all corona-deaths of people aged 49 or less are grouped together these days because there are so few that they could be traced to individuals otherwise. [0]: https://www.cdc.gov/drowning/facts/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/drowning/facts/index.html
  - ksaun 5y ago
    The information on that CDC page is misleading. While the page is about children, the text that mentions the 3960 annual drowning deaths does not specify "children," and the number seems to be across all age groups. This source states ~800 children deaths/year to be children (in 2014). [0] (I am not commenting on your overall point, just that statistic.) For reference, the CDC notes annual total US children deaths (if defining "children" as <= 14) as a little over 9000 (in 2019, I think). [1] [0] https://www.safekids.org/press-release/almost-800-kids-drown-each-year-more-half-are-under-age-5 https://www.safekids.org/press-release/almost-800-kids-drown... [1] https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/child-health.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/child-health.htm
    - Thiez 5y ago
ericbarrett 5y ago
"North Texas runs out of pediatric ICU beds amid Covid surge" (August 13): https://news.yahoo.com/north-texas-runs-pediatric-icu-175912035.html https://news.yahoo.com/north-texas-runs-pediatric-icu-175912...
- colordrops 5y ago
  Anecdote.
- CodeWriter23 5y ago
  Only 73 Pediatric ICU Beds in North Texas (from the Yahoo! Article)? This article puts a little different perspective on that reality - ‘No Staffed Pediatric ICU Beds Available’ In North Texas Area, DFW Hospital Council Says https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2021/08/12/no-staffed-pediatric-icu-beds-north-texas/ https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2021/08/12/no-staffed-pediatric-icu...
king_magic 5y ago
This is absolutely not true. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/child-covid-19-hospitalizations-new-high-august-2021-n1277119 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/child-covid-19-hospital...
firecall 5y ago
This is not true of Delta strain. Younger people, under 30, and children are getting it and ending up in hospital. It’s widely reported here in Australia. Children are at risk.
- colordrops 5y ago
  Data please.
- jtbayly 5y ago
  It's widely reported in the US, too. But the data doesn't bear it out.
  - shakna 5y ago
    The vast majority [0] of cases in Victoria are for the 20-29 age group. There are as many cases for the 10-19 age group as the 40-49 age group. The vast majority of currently active cases right now are for the 0-9 age group. Whilst there isn't a current breakdown of mortality by age rate, the overall mortality rate for Victoria is 4%, meaning that there is a high risk to children. The data does bear out the risk. [0] https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/victorian-coronavirus-covid-19-data#cases-by-age-group-and-gender https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/victorian-coronavirus-cov...
    - jtbayly 5y ago
      > The vast majority of currently active cases right now are for the 0-9 age group. Either I can't read graphs, or you can't. And you absolutely cannot take the overall mortality rate and apply it to the one age group we know practically none have died from in the past. So, as I said, the data doesn't bear this out so far as I've seen.
      - shakna 5y ago
        > Either I can't read graphs, or you can't. That would be _you_. Here's the numbers from said active case graph. + 0-9 - 112 + 10-19 - 100 + 20-29 - 78 + 30-39 - 105 + 40-49 - 54 + 50-59 - 25 + 60-69 - 14 + 70-79 - 3 + 80-89 - 1
HarryHirsch 5y ago
Early this year it looked as if the virus was on the way out in Israel until they started opening up schools again. The risk to children is small, but it's a communicable disease - school is how it spreads between households. When doing risk assessments I wish people started looking beyond their own immediate circle. Then again, Pharao let the Children of Israel go only after his own firstborn son died.
- CountDrewku 5y ago
  Asymptomatic spread of the virus is negligible from everything I've read. Children that don't show symptoms aren't a threat. Additionally, there's really no evidence that schools are spreading the virus more. https://www.npr.org/2020/10/21/925794511/were-the-risks-of-reopening-schools-exaggerated https://www.npr.org/2020/10/21/925794511/were-the-risks-of-r...
anyonecancode 5y ago
I suspect the reason children are the hold up here is less around current data than around where we are in this pandemic and patterns of thought/risk assessment. Here's an analogy that maybe will work with the HN crowd. Say we've got a service that, for 75% of the API endpoints, often gets a severe error. 25% of the endpoints only very rarely get the same error. My team discovers that by applying one simple change to the 75% of the affected endpoints, their error rate drops dramatically. We can't, for whatever reason, apply the same fix to those 25% yet, but we're confident that within a relatively short amount of time we'll be able to. Do we declare that the service is now working well and move on to other items? Maybe -- in a real setting it'll of course depend on what other priorities the team's juggling at the moment. Maybe this is "good enough" to move on. Still, I think we can all relate to the emotional pull to say "hold on, we still don't actually know why those 25% of our endpoints weren't affected as often. Something could easily change there so that we start seeing similar error rates. We have a fix on the way for this -- can we wait just a bit longer so we can roll this out?" I think that's where a lot of people are. Again, one could certainly argue that we're close enough, but OTOH I think the reluctance to declare this "over" yet makes a lot of sense too.
- colordrops 5y ago
  Too many holes in this analogy. For instance, there are other unrelated errors that happen more frequently.

jcrben 5y ago

Nearly 300 hospitalized per day, nearly 500 dead so far. https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/07/health/children-covid-19-protection/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/07/health/children-covid-19-prot... Unknown how many will long-term health effects. Even seemingly innocuous viruses like Epstein-Barr are tied to various health problems later in life. Why should we knowingly expose an entire generation to a little understood virus?

colordrops 5y ago
So less than one in a million children hospitalized per day. And 500 dead after almost two years is nothing, sorry to be so blunt. You can say epstein-barr, I can say other corona viruses like the cold virus. You can't just choose an arbitrary virus to compare to. We need strong evidence of serious risk to impose such restrictions, and not ungrounded fear which is not backed by data.
- Aa9C4xPz43Gg7k6 5y ago
  Fear mongers run out of ammunition for forever lockdowns. Low quality of arguments will be compensated by hysteria and insults. For instance that you don't care about children (while in their age group it's less harmful than a flu).
  - Gibbon1 5y ago
    Two things. Vaccines got full approval today. And with it the powers that be's patience with people with your view point it as and end. And We're about 5-6 weeks away from vaccines to be approved for children 5-11 years old. With that the hammers going to come down on people whose argument for prolonging this is 'I don't wanna'
    - colordrops 5y ago
      Supporting vaccinations and supporting lockdowns are separate. You can support one and not the other.
MatteoFrigo 5y ago
CNN is fake news. Stop spreading misinformation. Raw mortality data at https://euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ https://euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ show no discernible increase in mortality for children 0-14 in England (or anywhere else for that matter).
nkohari 5y ago
Influenza kills thousands of people under 18 every year: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html We are actually _incredibly_ fortunate that Covid spares children to the degree that it does.
- throwaway169169 5y ago
  > Influenza kills thousands of people under 18 every year: No, it does not. You didn't actually look at the numbers. One of the worst years overall shows 115 for 0-4 and 528 for 5-17: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm There are some years where the total is a little over a thousand, but most are well below. Don't spread this bull.
  - qweqwweqwe-90i 5y ago
    So looks like more kids were hospitalized and more died from the flu? What bull are you referring to? Were you outraged about them in any of the last 20 years?
    - throwaway169169 5y ago
      > What bull are you referring to? The bull that was clearly quoted? "Influenza kills thousands of people under 18 every year". The linked data does not say that at all. You're being difficult just to be difficult here.
  - nkohari 5y ago
    With apologies, I'll correct myself: flu kills hundreds, sometimes thousands of children per year. My point still stands, though: an equal or greater number of people under 18 are lost every year to influenza than have been lost to Covid. It's important to keep that in perspective, is all I'm saying.
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > My point still stands, though: an equal or greater number of people under 18 are lost every year to influenza than have been lost to Covid. This is false if you include the period during which COVID-19 has been around in “every year”, because COVID countermeasures also suppress the flu. Without COVID countermeasures, and without vaccination for most kids, COVID would kill far more than the flu normally does. Now, the COVID vaccine right now is more effective than the flu vaccine usually is (but that may be temporary if COVID is endemic and different variants proliferate), so with vaccines available to younger kids than now that might get evened out or reverse, but right now COVID is clearly far more deadly to kids.

luffapi 5y ago

There are risks to all of us when we let millions of children act as a breeding and mutation substrate for the virus. I would think that would be blinding obvious to anyone with even a basic grasp of biology. It’s also completely unknown what the long term effects of the virus are. Edit: Disappointed but not surprised by the amount of anti-science on this site. I feel like a lot of people have let politics destroy their ability to think critically to the point of near suicidal ignorance. Sad.

FridayoLeary 5y ago
>It’s also completely unknown what the long term effects of the virus are. Long term beyond a year and a half? I think it's safe to assume there is very little.
hcurtiss 5y ago
Given global vaccination rates, it will have abundant and plentiful opportunities for breeding and mutation forever. There is no vaccinating the entire globe for coronavirus. Certainly not in our lifetimes. And not given the declining effectiveness of the vaccines.
- luffapi 5y ago
  I agree that the whole globe will not be vaccinated and that will continue to be a problem. That doesn’t negate what I said though, unvaccinated children are a huge part of that problem. > And not given the low effectiveness of the vaccines. I have no idea what this means. It sounds like you’re under false impressions. The vaccines are quite effective.
  - hcurtiss 5y ago
    I meant “declining.” Revised simultaneous with your comment. If the vaccine immunity does not persist and requires boosters, we will never reach global here immunity. The parent article is on point.
- x1ph0z 5y ago

laputan_machine 5y ago

It's not about children getting it and being ill, it's about children getting it and spreading it. This is the concept behind 'herd immunity'. If we can cut the chain, we mitigate older and people with weakened immune systems from getting it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herd_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herd_immunity

Expirat 5y ago
> It's not about children getting it and being ill, it's about children getting it and spreading it. Vaccinated people can still get ill and spread it so why do you keep pushing vaccines to children who have no risk whatsoever if the vulnerable groups have been vaccinated and are safe??
cm2187 5y ago
But if vaccinated people are also spreading it, I don't get the point of waiting for kids to be vaccinated. The population at risk being vaccinated was the big deal, but that's done now (apart from those who refuse to be vaccinated, but then it is their problem).
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  > Bit if vaccinated people are also spreading it They are less likely to be infected, and it looks like they have a shorter infectious period. Herd immunity may be achievable with this in mind, but no one really knows right now. New variants may change the calculus too.
  - nradov 5y ago
    The Delta variant is contagious enough that we'll never achieve a level of herd immunity sufficient to protect unvaccinated people. All of us will be infected eventually, it's basically inevitable. Fortunately the vaccines are very effective at preventing deaths. https://www.businessinsider.com/delta-variant-made-herd-immunity-not-possible-astrazeneca-developer-2021-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/delta-variant-made-herd-immu...

brown9-2 5y ago

If you want to talk about “real risk” then I think it’s only fair to ask you to define what that acceptable risk level is.

colordrops 5y ago
It's the job of those imposing restrictions to define the risk.
Thiez 5y ago
Almost 4000 children die each year from drowning in the USA, with double that having a non-fatal drowning [0]. Note that non-fatal drownings can cause long-term health problems. They haven't banned pools yet, so it follows that, as a country, the USA considers 4000 dead children an acceptable risk of having open water, such as rivers, ponds, and pools. And bath tubs, I suppose. Now with that number in mind, how many children are expected to die if all of them were to be infected with covid-19? I found it hard to find some numbers about this, in my country all corona-deaths of people aged 49 or less are grouped together these days because there are so few that they could be traced to individuals otherwise. [0]: https://www.cdc.gov/drowning/facts/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/drowning/facts/index.html
- ksaun 5y ago
  The information on that CDC page is misleading. While the page is about children, the text that mentions the 3960 annual drowning deaths does not specify "children," and the number seems to be across all age groups. This source states ~800 children deaths/year to be children (in 2014). [0] (I am not commenting on your overall point, just that statistic.) For reference, the CDC notes annual total US children deaths (if defining "children" as <= 14) as a little over 9000 (in 2019, I think). [1] [0] https://www.safekids.org/press-release/almost-800-kids-drown-each-year-more-half-are-under-age-5 https://www.safekids.org/press-release/almost-800-kids-drown... [1] https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/child-health.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/child-health.htm
  - Thiez 5y ago

ericbarrett 5y ago

"North Texas runs out of pediatric ICU beds amid Covid surge" (August 13): https://news.yahoo.com/north-texas-runs-pediatric-icu-175912035.html https://news.yahoo.com/north-texas-runs-pediatric-icu-175912...

colordrops 5y ago
Anecdote.
CodeWriter23 5y ago
Only 73 Pediatric ICU Beds in North Texas (from the Yahoo! Article)? This article puts a little different perspective on that reality - ‘No Staffed Pediatric ICU Beds Available’ In North Texas Area, DFW Hospital Council Says https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2021/08/12/no-staffed-pediatric-icu-beds-north-texas/ https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2021/08/12/no-staffed-pediatric-icu...

king_magic 5y ago

This is absolutely not true. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/child-covid-19-hospitalizations-new-high-august-2021-n1277119 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/child-covid-19-hospital...

firecall 5y ago

This is not true of Delta strain. Younger people, under 30, and children are getting it and ending up in hospital. It’s widely reported here in Australia. Children are at risk.

colordrops 5y ago
Data please.
jtbayly 5y ago
It's widely reported in the US, too. But the data doesn't bear it out.
- shakna 5y ago
  The vast majority [0] of cases in Victoria are for the 20-29 age group. There are as many cases for the 10-19 age group as the 40-49 age group. The vast majority of currently active cases right now are for the 0-9 age group. Whilst there isn't a current breakdown of mortality by age rate, the overall mortality rate for Victoria is 4%, meaning that there is a high risk to children. The data does bear out the risk. [0] https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/victorian-coronavirus-covid-19-data#cases-by-age-group-and-gender https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/victorian-coronavirus-cov...
  - jtbayly 5y ago
    > The vast majority of currently active cases right now are for the 0-9 age group. Either I can't read graphs, or you can't. And you absolutely cannot take the overall mortality rate and apply it to the one age group we know practically none have died from in the past. So, as I said, the data doesn't bear this out so far as I've seen.
    - shakna 5y ago
      > Either I can't read graphs, or you can't. That would be _you_. Here's the numbers from said active case graph. + 0-9 - 112 + 10-19 - 100 + 20-29 - 78 + 30-39 - 105 + 40-49 - 54 + 50-59 - 25 + 60-69 - 14 + 70-79 - 3 + 80-89 - 1

HarryHirsch 5y ago

Early this year it looked as if the virus was on the way out in Israel until they started opening up schools again. The risk to children is small, but it's a communicable disease - school is how it spreads between households. When doing risk assessments I wish people started looking beyond their own immediate circle. Then again, Pharao let the Children of Israel go only after his own firstborn son died.

CountDrewku 5y ago
Asymptomatic spread of the virus is negligible from everything I've read. Children that don't show symptoms aren't a threat. Additionally, there's really no evidence that schools are spreading the virus more. https://www.npr.org/2020/10/21/925794511/were-the-risks-of-reopening-schools-exaggerated https://www.npr.org/2020/10/21/925794511/were-the-risks-of-r...

anyonecancode 5y ago

I suspect the reason children are the hold up here is less around current data than around where we are in this pandemic and patterns of thought/risk assessment. Here's an analogy that maybe will work with the HN crowd. Say we've got a service that, for 75% of the API endpoints, often gets a severe error. 25% of the endpoints only very rarely get the same error. My team discovers that by applying one simple change to the 75% of the affected endpoints, their error rate drops dramatically. We can't, for whatever reason, apply the same fix to those 25% yet, but we're confident that within a relatively short amount of time we'll be able to. Do we declare that the service is now working well and move on to other items? Maybe -- in a real setting it'll of course depend on what other priorities the team's juggling at the moment. Maybe this is "good enough" to move on. Still, I think we can all relate to the emotional pull to say "hold on, we still don't actually know why those 25% of our endpoints weren't affected as often. Something could easily change there so that we start seeing similar error rates. We have a fix on the way for this -- can we wait just a bit longer so we can roll this out?" I think that's where a lot of people are. Again, one could certainly argue that we're close enough, but OTOH I think the reluctance to declare this "over" yet makes a lot of sense too.

colordrops 5y ago
Too many holes in this analogy. For instance, there are other unrelated errors that happen more frequently.