YORK, Pa. — Many people have kids in school right now, despite the fact that COVID-19 is still out there. However, parents should be relieved to hear that a new study published last week confirms what was already suspected: that children generally do very well against COVID-19.
Pediatricians all over the world say they’ve seen good news from the British medical journal study, including that severe illness and death remain rare in kids with COVID-19.
The researchers looked at data of more than 600 COVID patients admitted to hospitals across England, Scotland and Wales between January and July. The young patients accounted for .9 percent of all patients in those hospitals at the time and only 1% of those children died, compared to 27% of COVID-19 patients of all ages over the same time period.
However, 11 percent of the children admitted for COVID-19 developed the dangerous MIS-C illness which is more common in minorities and kids ages 10-14. Multi-system inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C) in children is a rare, but severe condition that has been reported approximately 2–4 weeks after the onset of COVID-19 in children and adolescents.
“The most common presenting symptom of MIS-C were fatigue, headache muscle aches, sore throat and swollen lymph nodes,” said Dr. David Geier. He said although rare, children with MIS-C were also five times more likely than others to be admitted to critical care. Still, the report made it very clear that children on average, get very sick from COVID-19, much less than the rest of us.