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Children's Risk of Serious Illness from Covid-19 Is as Low as It Is for the Flu

105 points by stakkur 5y ago

dv_dt 5y ago
But the risk for children getting sick at school and bringing it back to their parents very much does not play out like the flu. I also think it is irresponsible for this article to not mention what ages they’re actually talking about. At some point there is a crossover of the risk and it may be in the younger to mid teens.
- NikolaeVarius 5y ago
  And the teachers. I know 2 teachers that are terrified that the kids will get them Covid-19, since they already get sick from the petri dishes that are children.
  - throwawayboise 5y ago
    Are they not vaccinated? Do they not trust that the vaccine works, at least as far as preventing serious illness?
    - magicalhippo 5y ago
      Here in Norway the vaccine rollout for non-critical people followed just age brackets. So I, a programmer with zero issues working from home, got the vaccine weeks before tons of younger teachers, who had to go to class each day and meet kids which could potentially infect them. I guess it would be complicated if they had to start introducing multiple levels, or some sort of "you can have my seat" functionality, still...
      - phamilton 5y ago
        In most US states teachers were prioritized along with firefighters, health workers, etc.
        ghaff 5y ago
        At least my state had a variety of non-age-related (self-reported) criteria for phases of eligibility including occupational and various health conditions.
    - NikolaeVarius 5y ago
      Yes they are. At least one of them has their health compromised and breakthrough cases have been a thing since day 1. Also, they work with a LOT of kids, so that alot more chances for exposure. They are not dumb.
    - HarryHirsch 5y ago
      - criley2 5y ago
        This is false. The current vaccine still makes one about 60x less likely to die of covid than being unvaccinated. It's ineffective at preventing infection to omicron, but highly effective at preventing death.
        HarryHirsch 5y ago
        I read that the risk of death is reduced about tenfold, and meanwhile you are still infectious. Not a risk I am willing to take. Why are non-pharmaceutical interventions downplayed? Where are the promised paid sick days?
        13415 5y ago
        I'm not sure I understand you correctly. You do not want to take a vaccine that provides a tenfold reduction of the risk of dying from the Omicron variant? Or are you arguing that vaccinations with the existing vaccines should continue until better vaccines are available, in combination with other measures such as lockdowns, mask wearing, mandatory testing and quarantine, etc. If it's the latter, that's what most countries are doing right now. If it's the former, then I don't understand your position.
        HarryHirsch 5y ago
        What I'm saying is that current vaccines are quite ineffectual against the present strain of the virus, and that NPI's, such as masking, social distancing, testing and quarantine are effective but not used. Having schools open in an active phase of the pandemic is the exact opposite of what should be done, that's how the virus spreads between households. Under the Orange Menace we had financial support for those who lost their jobs and loans for businesses that lost customers whereas the present administration fails to deliver at every front. They can't even do the promised paid sick leave. That's what would be needed now, instead we get shortened quarantine periods. You can't even get a quicktest if you wanted to.
  - throwaway_52828 5y ago
    If the teachers are vaxxed and boosted, COVID is less threatening than the flu. And if they aren’t, it seems like they don’t have grounds to complain. The only way this worry makes sense is if the teachers live with somebody who is highly immunocompromised. Which would indeed suck, but it’s crazy to design societal policy around those dangers.
    - dv_dt 5y ago
      Is less threatening for the single short outlook of being hospitalized. We still do not know the long term effects of Covid across a large population and it seems our governments have given up in favor of continued service in the economy.
      - hadlock 5y ago
        Yep this is important; Polio presented a lot like the flu, it wasn't until years or decades later that symptoms showed up. They didn't call it "long polio" though, they called it "post-polio syndrome". Famous author of 2001: A Space Odyssey Arthur C. Clarke ended up in a wheelchair decades due to post-polio syndrome after he contracted polio
      - coryrc 5y ago
        What are you proposing otherwise? This: https://news.yahoo.com/remote-learning-led-to-catastrophic-learning-loss-new-study-finds-143532040.html https://news.yahoo.com/remote-learning-led-to-catastrophic-l... Catastrophic learning loss. Any parents who can't afford nannies and won't die without working have had one leave the workforce. The ones who would die have just abandoned their kids. What I would propose is movement away from nuclear family to more communal living and extended family, but I just see oblivious people push remote learning like it actually solves the problem for most.
        dv_dt 5y ago
        It seems the the conclusion that remote learning causes learning loss is very premature and not differentable from a lot of other factors that occurred simultaneously. Massive job losses, or incredible stresses on parents and family units, learning curve on remot resources, not a full year with massive educational environment changes, alternate standard testing regeimes, etc. That conclusion does however support a push for a return to work economic policy.
- stakkur 5y ago
  >"But the risk for children getting sick at school and bringing it back to their parents very much not does not play out like the flu." I don't think this is true, and I'd be interested to see data that backs up that claim. On that topic, here's a thoughtful article that dives into claims like that: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/07/the-kids-were-safe-from-covid-the-whole-time.html https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/07/the-kids-were-safe-f... My wife has been a public school teacher for 21 years, and has the same concerns and fears as anyone. Teachers, like other humans, have a spectrum of beliefs, concerns, and experiences.
  - dv_dt 5y ago
    There have been studies that confirmed it with the older Covid strains which were less transferable than even delta, let alone Omicron. With increased transfer rates it becomes an even more viable vector. The article you quote says this “ Once you get to a certain point of community infection rates, it does look like being in-person … is associated with COVID spread in the community,” said Katharine Strunk, an author of the study and professor at Michigan State University.” We are back to high community infection rates with omicron.
    - jokethrowaway 5y ago
      The new variants are more contagious but less deadly, so the situation is probably better now.
    - kcplate 5y ago
      > There have been studies that confirmed it with the older Covid strains which were less transferable than even delta, let alone Omicron. With increased transfer rates it becomes an even more viable vector Please cite some. No offense but after nearly 2 years of constant rumor about this virus, the treatments, the vaccines, etc… when I see: “there are studies that show (fill in the blank)” with no studies cited—-I assume hearsay.
- hitpointdrew 5y ago
  The risk of anyone un-vaxxed going to the hospital after catching covid is 0.89% (source: https://news.gallup.com/opinion/gallup/354938/adults-estimates-covid-hospitalization-risk.aspx https://news.gallup.com/opinion/gallup/354938/adults-estimat...) and it is even lower than that if you are vaxxed. It is incredibly unnecessary and risky to vax children, and probably most adults. The only people that this vax should be recommended to are people in high-risk categorizes.
  - cinntaile 5y ago
    0,89% is a lot. That's why you vaccinate.
  - dv_dt 5y ago
    There is an uncharacterized unknown risk in the long term post-sickness effects of Covid. Many may survive the immediate sickness but virus remains in the most for at least months, and there could be long term tissue damage or other changes. Also I’m not sure why you say the vaccine is such a risk for children. It’s currently undergoing study and an even younger age range is close to being approved. In general we are talking about a vaccine with some minuscule portion of the dna pattern of the virus vs getting exposed to the virus itself which includes the same pattern, and will get multiplied to millions of times higher exposure - along with many many other sequences of the full virus - all with unknown long term effects.
  - petmon 5y ago
    To be clear the 0.89% figure was obtained by dividing hospitalizations by population, so it includes many unvaccinated people who have not caught COVID (yet). The chance that an unvaccinated person who is COVID-positive will require hospitalization is around 3%.
    - cinntaile 5y ago
      Are these numbers for the US?
      - 5y ago
- kerabatsos 5y ago
  This is hardly ever mentioned. The fact that children easily spread it back to parents, etc. was (and still is) conveniently left out of the discussion - even prior to access to vaccinations it was simply ignored. It’s one of the reasons we kept our children home from school, the first year of the pandemic. There were even “experts” arguing that children just didn’t spread the virus at all - which turned out to be ludicrous.
  - dpark 5y ago
    > This is hardly ever mentioned. The fact that children easily spread it back to parents, etc… In no way was this ever left out of the discussion. This is a major part of the reason for all the virtual schooling that happened last year. There were some early reports that children weren’t spreading COVID, and to my knowledge that data was correct. Delta changed that due to the ease with which it spread. But even in the context of early COVID variants, transmission from students to at risk adults was a common topic.
  - xboxnolifes 5y ago
    > The fact that children easily spread it back to parents, etc. was (and still is) conveniently left out of the discussion Left out of the discussion? This is basically the entire discussion when vaccinating school children is ever brought up. It's the only defensible position to take.
    - socceroos 5y ago
      Why is it a defensible position when vaccinated youth spread COVID at significantly the same rate as unvaccinated youth?
      - xboxnolifes 5y ago
        Sorry, I wasn't clear. I meant it is the only defensible position to take if you are trying to instate vaccine mandate for school children. Considering children's risk for covid, having the primary worry be their own health is pretty hard to defend.
- triceratops 5y ago
  The parents should be vaccinated, unless they have medical reason for not being able to. I'm vaccinated and I'm not particularly concerned about my kids bringing the virus home now. I'm more worried for them.
- dukeofdoom 5y ago
  Since children can't provide their own informed consent, its very morally dubious to give them medical treatments for something that is unlikely to make them sick, and seems on balance for the benefit of the parents. This is quite different from the other vaccines they currently take. In the event that the covid vaccine turn out to have long term health effects, a child has a long life to live with those side effects, unlike a 70 year old. So their risk is greater, and their potential suffering much longer lasting. Societies have generally made sacrifices for their children, and not sacrificed their children for the benefit of the elderly. The courts have also generally held the interests of the child supersedes the interests of the parents.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - squiffsquiff 5y ago
    There's a significant precedent in this area: Rubella. Vaccinations are typically provided at 3-4 months of age (e.g. in UK). Rubella is typically a relatively mild disease with the exception of pregnancy when it can have severe effects on the foetus. The principal beneficiaries are those becoming pregnant many years later and the unvaccinated in the general population. This isn't contentious. Why is a similar position regarding COVID vaccination?
  - dv_dt 5y ago
    Harm is not limited to direct medical causes. Parents dying of Covid will cause significant mental and financial harm
- usaphp 5y ago
  But parents can be are vaccinated if they want to. This hopefully will eliminate a need for a mandate on children vaccination.
- Jansen312 5y ago
  Same severity as common flu. I got sick from common flu that my kids brought back. The issue here is basically how many percentage you get severe flu vs severe covid. Current covid is significantly milder compare to earlier one just came out from China plus majority has been vaccinated. Current flu is also significantly milder than the one responsible for Spanish or bird flu. Response need to be measured and not a one size fit all. Healthcare (admin side) will love to continue these as they can claim from government. You shouldn't take at face value whatever these healthcare professional is preaching at 100%. You can now go to 10 hospitals and it will be much less severe than if you do so just 9-12mths ago. Even during the height of covid, death rate from covid is around 4% (flu is like undee 0.2%). With 80% almost no symptom. Plus if you actually do extensive test, death rate will be way lower than 4%. Singapore proved that with their exceptionally low death rate due to their exceptional testing (increasing the denominator). My key point here is measured response. At some point we need to get back to normal lives just like the Americans that gone thru Spanish flu, polio and smallpox. The next time people around you talk about how dreadful Omicron is, ask them how many died due to Omicron strain. Ask why healthy infected Omicron is such a serious statistics when people dying or even "maimed" by Omicron is unreported or statistically not "recorded" or "published". Also asked yourself this, flu vaccines have been around for decades and many children did died from common flu, why you and the people you know didn't get flu jab religiously?
r721 5y ago
>May 25, 2021 All those studies should be done again for Omicron as it's significantly different.
- kgin 5y ago
  Discussion among inpatient pediatric doctors about rising child COVID admissions with omicron: https://np.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/rpr28r/pediatricians_what_are_you_seeing/ https://np.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/rpr28r/pediatricia...
shrubble 5y ago
Note that in my state at least the omicron variant is at about 90% prevalence; this might indicate even lower risk both for the children and their families.
thrower123 5y ago
The abrupt shift in official narrative over the last week has been head-spinning
- bjt 5y ago
  This article is from May 2021.
- tiahura 5y ago
  When we heard Joe Biden say that Covid was the states’ responsibility, and the press not report the complete flip-flop, we knew the stuff was about to hit the fan.
  - dukeofdoom 5y ago
    The fact that Psaki gave Trump credit for coming up with the vaccine during a press conference last week, kind of tells you were this is going.
russdill 5y ago
Keep in mind of course that a chart of the risk of serious illness from the flu by age range looks like a saddle. The risk for those 5-49 is pretty low. But the risk for those 0-4 and 50-64 are both much higher.
- gnicholas 5y ago
  Does the saddle look the same for COVID? Newborns are certainly uniquely susceptible to any illness, but I've not seen evidence that toddlers (2-4) are at especially high risk. Does anyone have data on how serious illness affects kids at these ages?
  - Pyramus 5y ago
    Yes, it does seem to look the same for Covid, see e.g. here [1]. Note that this paper is likely before Delta, and the age bracket 0-4 does not match yours. [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2918-0/figures/2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2918-0/figures/2
    - gnicholas 5y ago
      Thanks for the link. I guess it does look roughly like the trends for the flu, though honestly neither one looks like a saddle to me. A saddle is much more symmetrical, and these look more like linear functions with a small blip on the far left side. I'd still be interested to know if the 0-4 age group has homogeneous risk, or if the real risk is among 0-6 (or 12) month old babies. I have a 2 year old and we have been very cautious, but haven't seen any evidence that kids this age are at much risk for serious illness or death.
      - jrtc27 5y ago
        The graph is deceptive; it's a semi-log plot, so the linearity is really exponential.
        gnicholas 5y ago
it_does_follow 5y ago
The issue is omicron seems to be spreading, at last from what I've seen, faster than the flu (and unquestionably faster than delta). Most seasonal flu I've lived through, I've never seen everyone in the household come down with it immediately at the same time. In my home everyone came down with covid, kids and adults, almost exactly at the same time with the same symptoms. Omicron can be 0.1 times as lethal as delta, but if it spreads to 20 times as many people as delta it will still be twice as deadly. Clearly we don't have enough information right now to do the calculus, it looks like omicron is less severe, it looks like it's more contagious, but how exactly this balances out seems to be unknown. Though I have seen more hospitals in my region reporting record admissions. I'm still seeing bars in the area sending out email campaigns encouraging people to come up and party for NYE. It's funny that while requiring vaccines they make no mention of "stay home if you feel sick". Right now I don't think we have enough information to correctly assess the real risk of actively encourage people to gather for NYE, but given what we do know it certainly seems like a risky idea. edit: I'll add the "as low as" phrasing is a bit odd, since my understanding of past variants is that their risk to children was lower than the flu. This means that, relative to other variants, being "as serious as the flu" would be an upgrade in the level of risk.
- gnicholas 5y ago
  The flu can spread very quickly as well. My child's class was hit by the flu 2 years ago, just before COVID lockdowns began. More than 3/4 of the kids in her entire grade got sick at the same time. We do expect that omicron will likely hit in a similar fashion once it surfaces in her school, despite the indoor/outdoor mask requirements and relatively high levels of child vaccination.
chomp 5y ago
Article is from May 25, 2021, this is mostly out of date news. Kids younger than 12 (5 years - 11 years) can get the vaccine now, so there's even less cause for concern.
buttersbrian 5y ago
As my kid contracted COVID yesterday on his 1st birthday and has a fever of 100.9. Oof.
- bognition 5y ago
  I’m so sorry
- morsch 5y ago
  That's a fever, but not a particularly high one, right? 40C/104F is what I'd consider high and that seems to be the norm around here, though I've met parents who wait even beyond that before giving medication. Hope your kid is back on their feet soon!
- jansan 5y ago
  As the other poster wrote, 100,9F is not particularly high. Here doctors recommend to keep fever below 39° (102,2F). When my child had the flu, we achieved this by alternating between Ibuprofen and Paracetamol in order to keep the doses low. All the best to you.
- lostmsu 5y ago
  We had regular RSV with 100.4 for a few days.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- scruple 5y ago
  My twins both had Roseola around the same time, when they were about 18 months and had recently entered day care. They both went around 104* F.
- senectus1 5y ago
  Not a really bad fever, and try not to treat it with anything but fluids.. remember that a fever is a more often than not a GOOD thing. its the body raising the alarm system wide. let it do its thing (to a degree, you don't want it too high for too long. obviously. Also seek medical advice from a medical practitioner)
miriam_catira 5y ago
Does this directly contradict this claim? (Not to mention how old this article is... ) US children hospitalized with COVID in near-record numbers https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-pandemics-seattle-centers-for-disease-control-and-prevention-75a48388d6ca85ad88de300f32bfdec6 https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-pande... (that is an ugly ugly link, apologies even though there's not a lot I can do there)
- pontus 5y ago
  They specifically refer to the increased rate of hospitalization in the article. Their refutation is that about half of the hospitalizations are actually due to other reasons like broken bones and that mandatory Covid tests uncover an otherwise asymptomatic case. However due to reporting rules, apparently these cases are still considered Covid hospitalizations.
- aaomidi 5y ago
  That number I think matches what flu hospitalization is for children. Otoh (not saying you don't know this) viruses don't just "kill" or "not kill". They can have serious, life altering changes on people. So just measuring hospitalization or death isn't that useful.
- singlow 5y ago
  I don't think so. Rate of infection and risk of illness are two separate statistics that may not be correlated. It doesn't mention whether the child hospitalization rate is higher or lower for Covid vs the flu. The near-record numbers are only compared to previous Covid hospitalizations. All that means is we are close to having as many sick children with covid as we have had at any point since the pandemic started. It doesn't say anything about severity compared to flu. Comparing hospitalization rates with the flu is difficult. If a child has Covid and has moderately severe symptoms, they are probably more likely to go to the hospital than a child with the same level of symptoms and the flu, just because Covid is less familiar. That is especially true if you are looking at flu hospitalizations from pre-pandemic periods. Comparing mortality would probably be more relevant. A child with the Flu in 2019 was probably not going to go to the hospital unless she was turning blue or had an extremely high fever. With Covid i would probably take my child to the hospital if she was having any difficulty breathing, at a threshold much lower than what I would have gotten concerned about for the flu. That may or may not be a valid distinction for a parent to make. This research suggests that a parent of a child with flu or covid should probably have the same level of precaution.
sjg007 5y ago
This article is from before Delta and is way out of date. Even at face value at the time, the numbers show that covid is worse than the flu in terms of pediatric deaths. And that was pre-delta and now omicron. Things are likely better now that kids can be vaccinated but even at the time this was a nonsense argument from NPR.
- skazka16 5y ago
  South Africa health minister confirmed that Omicron is a mild variant and is far less dangerous than Delta. It has also been confirmed that children: 1. Have higher chances of getting myocarditis after getting vaccinated. 2. Develop long lasting immunity after being exposed to the virus [1] That makes me believe that there is absolutely no reason to vaccinate kids. [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-021-01089-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-021-01089-8
  - evan_ 5y ago
    if it's half as likely to send you to the hospital but it spreads four times as quickly, it will still send twice as many people to the hospital.
  - sjg007 5y ago
    I mean #1 has been widely debunked and in #2 they didn't test against Delta or Omicron. Maybe the results generalize but from the adult studies we've seen all show reduced neutralizing responses to Delta and Omicron as compared to the original strain. Prior infection seems better against Delta but omicron is it's own thing as in immunity is not maintained. Interestingly omicron infection may protect against delta however. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/232698/omicron-largely-evades-immunity-from-past/ https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/232698/omicron-largely-evade... "Plasma samples from 19 children and 18 adults at >6 months after primary infection were tested for binding to spike and RBD from Alpha (B.1.1.7), Beta (B.1.351) and Gamma (P.1) variants compared to the original Wuhan genotype, which was used in previous assays."
    - skazka16 5y ago
LatteLazy 5y ago
People really seem to struggle with multiple facts. It is a fact otherwise healthy kids hardly ever have serious COVID infection consequences. It is a fact they give infections to others who don't do as well. It is a fact many kids aren't otherwise healthy and have a much higher rate of death and complications. It is a fact that even a very small rate of deaths or complications is a lot of dead kids when you're a big country like the USA. Yet people pick only one fact and act like it is the one true fact that trump's all overs.
- bobthechef 5y ago
cblconfederate 5y ago
The UK JVCI recommends vaccination only for children who are in contact with immunosuppressed people.
nojokes 5y ago
Newer and larger study: Thirty-Day Outcomes of Children and Adolescents With COVID-19: An International Experience https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/148/3/e2020042929/179730/Thirty-Day-Outcomes-of-Children-and-Adolescents https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/148/3/e20200... Is this truth? I really do not know.
- Aachen 5y ago
  Why not share the results rather than a link-only comment? > Dyspnea, bronchiolitis, anosmia, and gastrointestinal symptoms were more common in COVID-19 than influenza. In-hospital prevalent treatments for COVID-19 included repurposed medications (<10%) and adjunctive therapies: systemic corticosteroids (6.8%–7.6%), famotidine (9.0%–28.1%), and antithrombotics such as aspirin (2.0%–21.4%), heparin (2.2%–18.1%), and enoxaparin (2.8%–14.8%). Hospitalization was observed in 0.3% to 1.3% of the cohort diagnosed with COVID-19, with undetectable (n < 5 per database) 30-day fatality. Thirty-day outcomes including pneumonia and hypoxemia were more frequent in COVID-19 than influenza.
hvacmike 5y ago
[dead]
peppermint_tea 5y ago
this article is from may 2021. I suggest we add a warning to the title since the omicron may cause more harm to children. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/30/omicron-is-sending-thousands-of-children-to-us-hospitals https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/30/omicron-is-sending...

105 points by stakkur 5y ago

But the risk for children getting sick at school and bringing it back to their parents very much does not play out like the flu. I also think it is irresponsible for this article to not mention what ages they’re actually talking about. At some point there is a crossover of the risk and it may be in the younger to mid teens.

NikolaeVarius 5y ago
And the teachers. I know 2 teachers that are terrified that the kids will get them Covid-19, since they already get sick from the petri dishes that are children.
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  Are they not vaccinated? Do they not trust that the vaccine works, at least as far as preventing serious illness?
  - magicalhippo 5y ago
    Here in Norway the vaccine rollout for non-critical people followed just age brackets. So I, a programmer with zero issues working from home, got the vaccine weeks before tons of younger teachers, who had to go to class each day and meet kids which could potentially infect them. I guess it would be complicated if they had to start introducing multiple levels, or some sort of "you can have my seat" functionality, still...
    - phamilton 5y ago
      In most US states teachers were prioritized along with firefighters, health workers, etc.
      - ghaff 5y ago
        At least my state had a variety of non-age-related (self-reported) criteria for phases of eligibility including occupational and various health conditions.
  - NikolaeVarius 5y ago
    Yes they are. At least one of them has their health compromised and breakthrough cases have been a thing since day 1. Also, they work with a LOT of kids, so that alot more chances for exposure. They are not dumb.
  - HarryHirsch 5y ago
    - criley2 5y ago
      This is false. The current vaccine still makes one about 60x less likely to die of covid than being unvaccinated. It's ineffective at preventing infection to omicron, but highly effective at preventing death.
      - HarryHirsch 5y ago
        I read that the risk of death is reduced about tenfold, and meanwhile you are still infectious. Not a risk I am willing to take. Why are non-pharmaceutical interventions downplayed? Where are the promised paid sick days?
        13415 5y ago
        I'm not sure I understand you correctly. You do not want to take a vaccine that provides a tenfold reduction of the risk of dying from the Omicron variant? Or are you arguing that vaccinations with the existing vaccines should continue until better vaccines are available, in combination with other measures such as lockdowns, mask wearing, mandatory testing and quarantine, etc. If it's the latter, that's what most countries are doing right now. If it's the former, then I don't understand your position.
        HarryHirsch 5y ago
        What I'm saying is that current vaccines are quite ineffectual against the present strain of the virus, and that NPI's, such as masking, social distancing, testing and quarantine are effective but not used. Having schools open in an active phase of the pandemic is the exact opposite of what should be done, that's how the virus spreads between households. Under the Orange Menace we had financial support for those who lost their jobs and loans for businesses that lost customers whereas the present administration fails to deliver at every front. They can't even do the promised paid sick leave. That's what would be needed now, instead we get shortened quarantine periods. You can't even get a quicktest if you wanted to.
- throwaway_52828 5y ago
  If the teachers are vaxxed and boosted, COVID is less threatening than the flu. And if they aren’t, it seems like they don’t have grounds to complain. The only way this worry makes sense is if the teachers live with somebody who is highly immunocompromised. Which would indeed suck, but it’s crazy to design societal policy around those dangers.
  - dv_dt 5y ago
    Is less threatening for the single short outlook of being hospitalized. We still do not know the long term effects of Covid across a large population and it seems our governments have given up in favor of continued service in the economy.
    - hadlock 5y ago
      Yep this is important; Polio presented a lot like the flu, it wasn't until years or decades later that symptoms showed up. They didn't call it "long polio" though, they called it "post-polio syndrome". Famous author of 2001: A Space Odyssey Arthur C. Clarke ended up in a wheelchair decades due to post-polio syndrome after he contracted polio
    - coryrc 5y ago
      What are you proposing otherwise? This: https://news.yahoo.com/remote-learning-led-to-catastrophic-learning-loss-new-study-finds-143532040.html https://news.yahoo.com/remote-learning-led-to-catastrophic-l... Catastrophic learning loss. Any parents who can't afford nannies and won't die without working have had one leave the workforce. The ones who would die have just abandoned their kids. What I would propose is movement away from nuclear family to more communal living and extended family, but I just see oblivious people push remote learning like it actually solves the problem for most.
      - dv_dt 5y ago
        It seems the the conclusion that remote learning causes learning loss is very premature and not differentable from a lot of other factors that occurred simultaneously. Massive job losses, or incredible stresses on parents and family units, learning curve on remot resources, not a full year with massive educational environment changes, alternate standard testing regeimes, etc. That conclusion does however support a push for a return to work economic policy.
stakkur 5y ago
>"But the risk for children getting sick at school and bringing it back to their parents very much not does not play out like the flu." I don't think this is true, and I'd be interested to see data that backs up that claim. On that topic, here's a thoughtful article that dives into claims like that: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/07/the-kids-were-safe-from-covid-the-whole-time.html https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/07/the-kids-were-safe-f... My wife has been a public school teacher for 21 years, and has the same concerns and fears as anyone. Teachers, like other humans, have a spectrum of beliefs, concerns, and experiences.
- dv_dt 5y ago
  There have been studies that confirmed it with the older Covid strains which were less transferable than even delta, let alone Omicron. With increased transfer rates it becomes an even more viable vector. The article you quote says this “ Once you get to a certain point of community infection rates, it does look like being in-person … is associated with COVID spread in the community,” said Katharine Strunk, an author of the study and professor at Michigan State University.” We are back to high community infection rates with omicron.
  - jokethrowaway 5y ago
    The new variants are more contagious but less deadly, so the situation is probably better now.
  - kcplate 5y ago
    > There have been studies that confirmed it with the older Covid strains which were less transferable than even delta, let alone Omicron. With increased transfer rates it becomes an even more viable vector Please cite some. No offense but after nearly 2 years of constant rumor about this virus, the treatments, the vaccines, etc… when I see: “there are studies that show (fill in the blank)” with no studies cited—-I assume hearsay.
hitpointdrew 5y ago
The risk of anyone un-vaxxed going to the hospital after catching covid is 0.89% (source: https://news.gallup.com/opinion/gallup/354938/adults-estimates-covid-hospitalization-risk.aspx https://news.gallup.com/opinion/gallup/354938/adults-estimat...) and it is even lower than that if you are vaxxed. It is incredibly unnecessary and risky to vax children, and probably most adults. The only people that this vax should be recommended to are people in high-risk categorizes.
- cinntaile 5y ago
  0,89% is a lot. That's why you vaccinate.
- dv_dt 5y ago
  There is an uncharacterized unknown risk in the long term post-sickness effects of Covid. Many may survive the immediate sickness but virus remains in the most for at least months, and there could be long term tissue damage or other changes. Also I’m not sure why you say the vaccine is such a risk for children. It’s currently undergoing study and an even younger age range is close to being approved. In general we are talking about a vaccine with some minuscule portion of the dna pattern of the virus vs getting exposed to the virus itself which includes the same pattern, and will get multiplied to millions of times higher exposure - along with many many other sequences of the full virus - all with unknown long term effects.
- petmon 5y ago
  To be clear the 0.89% figure was obtained by dividing hospitalizations by population, so it includes many unvaccinated people who have not caught COVID (yet). The chance that an unvaccinated person who is COVID-positive will require hospitalization is around 3%.
  - cinntaile 5y ago
    Are these numbers for the US?
    - 5y ago
kerabatsos 5y ago
This is hardly ever mentioned. The fact that children easily spread it back to parents, etc. was (and still is) conveniently left out of the discussion - even prior to access to vaccinations it was simply ignored. It’s one of the reasons we kept our children home from school, the first year of the pandemic. There were even “experts” arguing that children just didn’t spread the virus at all - which turned out to be ludicrous.
- dpark 5y ago
  > This is hardly ever mentioned. The fact that children easily spread it back to parents, etc… In no way was this ever left out of the discussion. This is a major part of the reason for all the virtual schooling that happened last year. There were some early reports that children weren’t spreading COVID, and to my knowledge that data was correct. Delta changed that due to the ease with which it spread. But even in the context of early COVID variants, transmission from students to at risk adults was a common topic.
- xboxnolifes 5y ago
  > The fact that children easily spread it back to parents, etc. was (and still is) conveniently left out of the discussion Left out of the discussion? This is basically the entire discussion when vaccinating school children is ever brought up. It's the only defensible position to take.
  - socceroos 5y ago
    Why is it a defensible position when vaccinated youth spread COVID at significantly the same rate as unvaccinated youth?
    - xboxnolifes 5y ago
      Sorry, I wasn't clear. I meant it is the only defensible position to take if you are trying to instate vaccine mandate for school children. Considering children's risk for covid, having the primary worry be their own health is pretty hard to defend.
triceratops 5y ago
The parents should be vaccinated, unless they have medical reason for not being able to. I'm vaccinated and I'm not particularly concerned about my kids bringing the virus home now. I'm more worried for them.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
Since children can't provide their own informed consent, its very morally dubious to give them medical treatments for something that is unlikely to make them sick, and seems on balance for the benefit of the parents. This is quite different from the other vaccines they currently take. In the event that the covid vaccine turn out to have long term health effects, a child has a long life to live with those side effects, unlike a 70 year old. So their risk is greater, and their potential suffering much longer lasting. Societies have generally made sacrifices for their children, and not sacrificed their children for the benefit of the elderly. The courts have also generally held the interests of the child supersedes the interests of the parents.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- squiffsquiff 5y ago
  There's a significant precedent in this area: Rubella. Vaccinations are typically provided at 3-4 months of age (e.g. in UK). Rubella is typically a relatively mild disease with the exception of pregnancy when it can have severe effects on the foetus. The principal beneficiaries are those becoming pregnant many years later and the unvaccinated in the general population. This isn't contentious. Why is a similar position regarding COVID vaccination?
- dv_dt 5y ago
  Harm is not limited to direct medical causes. Parents dying of Covid will cause significant mental and financial harm
usaphp 5y ago
But parents can be are vaccinated if they want to. This hopefully will eliminate a need for a mandate on children vaccination.
Jansen312 5y ago
Same severity as common flu. I got sick from common flu that my kids brought back. The issue here is basically how many percentage you get severe flu vs severe covid. Current covid is significantly milder compare to earlier one just came out from China plus majority has been vaccinated. Current flu is also significantly milder than the one responsible for Spanish or bird flu. Response need to be measured and not a one size fit all. Healthcare (admin side) will love to continue these as they can claim from government. You shouldn't take at face value whatever these healthcare professional is preaching at 100%. You can now go to 10 hospitals and it will be much less severe than if you do so just 9-12mths ago. Even during the height of covid, death rate from covid is around 4% (flu is like undee 0.2%). With 80% almost no symptom. Plus if you actually do extensive test, death rate will be way lower than 4%. Singapore proved that with their exceptionally low death rate due to their exceptional testing (increasing the denominator). My key point here is measured response. At some point we need to get back to normal lives just like the Americans that gone thru Spanish flu, polio and smallpox. The next time people around you talk about how dreadful Omicron is, ask them how many died due to Omicron strain. Ask why healthy infected Omicron is such a serious statistics when people dying or even "maimed" by Omicron is unreported or statistically not "recorded" or "published". Also asked yourself this, flu vaccines have been around for decades and many children did died from common flu, why you and the people you know didn't get flu jab religiously?

r721 5y ago

>May 25, 2021 All those studies should be done again for Omicron as it's significantly different.

kgin 5y ago
Discussion among inpatient pediatric doctors about rising child COVID admissions with omicron: https://np.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/rpr28r/pediatricians_what_are_you_seeing/ https://np.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/rpr28r/pediatricia...

shrubble 5y ago

Note that in my state at least the omicron variant is at about 90% prevalence; this might indicate even lower risk both for the children and their families.

thrower123 5y ago

The abrupt shift in official narrative over the last week has been head-spinning

bjt 5y ago
This article is from May 2021.
tiahura 5y ago
When we heard Joe Biden say that Covid was the states’ responsibility, and the press not report the complete flip-flop, we knew the stuff was about to hit the fan.
- dukeofdoom 5y ago
  The fact that Psaki gave Trump credit for coming up with the vaccine during a press conference last week, kind of tells you were this is going.

russdill 5y ago

Keep in mind of course that a chart of the risk of serious illness from the flu by age range looks like a saddle. The risk for those 5-49 is pretty low. But the risk for those 0-4 and 50-64 are both much higher.

gnicholas 5y ago
Does the saddle look the same for COVID? Newborns are certainly uniquely susceptible to any illness, but I've not seen evidence that toddlers (2-4) are at especially high risk. Does anyone have data on how serious illness affects kids at these ages?
- Pyramus 5y ago
  Yes, it does seem to look the same for Covid, see e.g. here [1]. Note that this paper is likely before Delta, and the age bracket 0-4 does not match yours. [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2918-0/figures/2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2918-0/figures/2
  - gnicholas 5y ago
    Thanks for the link. I guess it does look roughly like the trends for the flu, though honestly neither one looks like a saddle to me. A saddle is much more symmetrical, and these look more like linear functions with a small blip on the far left side. I'd still be interested to know if the 0-4 age group has homogeneous risk, or if the real risk is among 0-6 (or 12) month old babies. I have a 2 year old and we have been very cautious, but haven't seen any evidence that kids this age are at much risk for serious illness or death.
    - jrtc27 5y ago
      The graph is deceptive; it's a semi-log plot, so the linearity is really exponential.
      - gnicholas 5y ago

it_does_follow 5y ago

The issue is omicron seems to be spreading, at last from what I've seen, faster than the flu (and unquestionably faster than delta). Most seasonal flu I've lived through, I've never seen everyone in the household come down with it immediately at the same time. In my home everyone came down with covid, kids and adults, almost exactly at the same time with the same symptoms. Omicron can be 0.1 times as lethal as delta, but if it spreads to 20 times as many people as delta it will still be twice as deadly. Clearly we don't have enough information right now to do the calculus, it looks like omicron is less severe, it looks like it's more contagious, but how exactly this balances out seems to be unknown. Though I have seen more hospitals in my region reporting record admissions. I'm still seeing bars in the area sending out email campaigns encouraging people to come up and party for NYE. It's funny that while requiring vaccines they make no mention of "stay home if you feel sick". Right now I don't think we have enough information to correctly assess the real risk of actively encourage people to gather for NYE, but given what we do know it certainly seems like a risky idea. edit: I'll add the "as low as" phrasing is a bit odd, since my understanding of past variants is that their risk to children was lower than the flu. This means that, relative to other variants, being "as serious as the flu" would be an upgrade in the level of risk.

gnicholas 5y ago
The flu can spread very quickly as well. My child's class was hit by the flu 2 years ago, just before COVID lockdowns began. More than 3/4 of the kids in her entire grade got sick at the same time. We do expect that omicron will likely hit in a similar fashion once it surfaces in her school, despite the indoor/outdoor mask requirements and relatively high levels of child vaccination.

chomp 5y ago

Article is from May 25, 2021, this is mostly out of date news. Kids younger than 12 (5 years - 11 years) can get the vaccine now, so there's even less cause for concern.

buttersbrian 5y ago

As my kid contracted COVID yesterday on his 1st birthday and has a fever of 100.9. Oof.

bognition 5y ago
I’m so sorry
morsch 5y ago
That's a fever, but not a particularly high one, right? 40C/104F is what I'd consider high and that seems to be the norm around here, though I've met parents who wait even beyond that before giving medication. Hope your kid is back on their feet soon!
jansan 5y ago
As the other poster wrote, 100,9F is not particularly high. Here doctors recommend to keep fever below 39° (102,2F). When my child had the flu, we achieved this by alternating between Ibuprofen and Paracetamol in order to keep the doses low. All the best to you.
lostmsu 5y ago
We had regular RSV with 100.4 for a few days.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
scruple 5y ago
My twins both had Roseola around the same time, when they were about 18 months and had recently entered day care. They both went around 104* F.
senectus1 5y ago
Not a really bad fever, and try not to treat it with anything but fluids.. remember that a fever is a more often than not a GOOD thing. its the body raising the alarm system wide. let it do its thing (to a degree, you don't want it too high for too long. obviously. Also seek medical advice from a medical practitioner)

miriam_catira 5y ago

Does this directly contradict this claim? (Not to mention how old this article is... ) US children hospitalized with COVID in near-record numbers https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-pandemics-seattle-centers-for-disease-control-and-prevention-75a48388d6ca85ad88de300f32bfdec6 https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-pande... (that is an ugly ugly link, apologies even though there's not a lot I can do there)

pontus 5y ago
They specifically refer to the increased rate of hospitalization in the article. Their refutation is that about half of the hospitalizations are actually due to other reasons like broken bones and that mandatory Covid tests uncover an otherwise asymptomatic case. However due to reporting rules, apparently these cases are still considered Covid hospitalizations.
aaomidi 5y ago
That number I think matches what flu hospitalization is for children. Otoh (not saying you don't know this) viruses don't just "kill" or "not kill". They can have serious, life altering changes on people. So just measuring hospitalization or death isn't that useful.
singlow 5y ago
I don't think so. Rate of infection and risk of illness are two separate statistics that may not be correlated. It doesn't mention whether the child hospitalization rate is higher or lower for Covid vs the flu. The near-record numbers are only compared to previous Covid hospitalizations. All that means is we are close to having as many sick children with covid as we have had at any point since the pandemic started. It doesn't say anything about severity compared to flu. Comparing hospitalization rates with the flu is difficult. If a child has Covid and has moderately severe symptoms, they are probably more likely to go to the hospital than a child with the same level of symptoms and the flu, just because Covid is less familiar. That is especially true if you are looking at flu hospitalizations from pre-pandemic periods. Comparing mortality would probably be more relevant. A child with the Flu in 2019 was probably not going to go to the hospital unless she was turning blue or had an extremely high fever. With Covid i would probably take my child to the hospital if she was having any difficulty breathing, at a threshold much lower than what I would have gotten concerned about for the flu. That may or may not be a valid distinction for a parent to make. This research suggests that a parent of a child with flu or covid should probably have the same level of precaution.

sjg007 5y ago

This article is from before Delta and is way out of date. Even at face value at the time, the numbers show that covid is worse than the flu in terms of pediatric deaths. And that was pre-delta and now omicron. Things are likely better now that kids can be vaccinated but even at the time this was a nonsense argument from NPR.

skazka16 5y ago
South Africa health minister confirmed that Omicron is a mild variant and is far less dangerous than Delta. It has also been confirmed that children: 1. Have higher chances of getting myocarditis after getting vaccinated. 2. Develop long lasting immunity after being exposed to the virus [1] That makes me believe that there is absolutely no reason to vaccinate kids. [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-021-01089-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-021-01089-8
- evan_ 5y ago
  if it's half as likely to send you to the hospital but it spreads four times as quickly, it will still send twice as many people to the hospital.
- sjg007 5y ago
  I mean #1 has been widely debunked and in #2 they didn't test against Delta or Omicron. Maybe the results generalize but from the adult studies we've seen all show reduced neutralizing responses to Delta and Omicron as compared to the original strain. Prior infection seems better against Delta but omicron is it's own thing as in immunity is not maintained. Interestingly omicron infection may protect against delta however. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/232698/omicron-largely-evades-immunity-from-past/ https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/232698/omicron-largely-evade... "Plasma samples from 19 children and 18 adults at >6 months after primary infection were tested for binding to spike and RBD from Alpha (B.1.1.7), Beta (B.1.351) and Gamma (P.1) variants compared to the original Wuhan genotype, which was used in previous assays."
  - skazka16 5y ago

LatteLazy 5y ago

People really seem to struggle with multiple facts. It is a fact otherwise healthy kids hardly ever have serious COVID infection consequences. It is a fact they give infections to others who don't do as well. It is a fact many kids aren't otherwise healthy and have a much higher rate of death and complications. It is a fact that even a very small rate of deaths or complications is a lot of dead kids when you're a big country like the USA. Yet people pick only one fact and act like it is the one true fact that trump's all overs.

bobthechef 5y ago

cblconfederate 5y ago

The UK JVCI recommends vaccination only for children who are in contact with immunosuppressed people.

nojokes 5y ago

Newer and larger study: Thirty-Day Outcomes of Children and Adolescents With COVID-19: An International Experience https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/148/3/e2020042929/179730/Thirty-Day-Outcomes-of-Children-and-Adolescents https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/148/3/e20200... Is this truth? I really do not know.

Aachen 5y ago
Why not share the results rather than a link-only comment? > Dyspnea, bronchiolitis, anosmia, and gastrointestinal symptoms were more common in COVID-19 than influenza. In-hospital prevalent treatments for COVID-19 included repurposed medications (<10%) and adjunctive therapies: systemic corticosteroids (6.8%–7.6%), famotidine (9.0%–28.1%), and antithrombotics such as aspirin (2.0%–21.4%), heparin (2.2%–18.1%), and enoxaparin (2.8%–14.8%). Hospitalization was observed in 0.3% to 1.3% of the cohort diagnosed with COVID-19, with undetectable (n < 5 per database) 30-day fatality. Thirty-day outcomes including pneumonia and hypoxemia were more frequent in COVID-19 than influenza.

hvacmike 5y ago

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peppermint_tea 5y ago

this article is from may 2021. I suggest we add a warning to the title since the omicron may cause more harm to children. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/30/omicron-is-sending-thousands-of-children-to-us-hospitals https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/30/omicron-is-sending...