Almost half of the children in hospital recorded as having needed inpatient treatment for Covid may have actually needed treatment for something else and happened to test positive, a new U.S. study suggests. The MailOnline has the story.
Out of 117 children who tested positive were treated as inpatients in Stanford University’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, 53 were likely not sick enough from the virus itself to need inpatient treatment.
Children younger than 18 make up only 12.4% of U.S. Covid cases, and less than a fraction of a per cent of the total number of deaths from the virus, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data show.
An estimated one to three per cent of Covid hospitalisations for Covid are among children – but the new Stanford study suggests the real figure may be even lower…
The new study, published Wednesday in the journal Hospital Pediatrics, took a closer look at data on 117 children who were either hospitalized for a Covid-linked syndrome – MIS-C, which occurs after kids are infected with coronavirus – or who tested positive after arriving at the hospital.
The children were hospitalized between May 10th, 2020 and February 10th, 2021.
About 40% of those children were completely asymptomatic for Covid.
Another 28% displayed only symptoms of mild-to-moderate coronavirus infections.
Nine kids became severely ill from Covid, including three who probably were not hospitalized because of the infection, but became seriously sick with Covid during their stay, their medical charts suggest.
Only 15 out of the 117 children were determined to be critically ill (about 13%). Fourteen of them were likely brought to hospitals specifically because of their Covid symptoms.
One child was admitted to the hospital to undergo surgery for a congenital heart problem. They had no symptoms when they arrived at the hospital, but later tested positive and fell critically ill, likely due to the combination of Covid and their heart condition.
Fourteen children were diagnosed with MIS-C – multi-system inflammatory syndrome in children – which has been linked to Covid. These children may not have gotten severely ill during the acute phase of infection with coronavirus, but it set off a chain of immune responses that brought on the potentially life-threatening inflammation.
All-in-all, only a little over half of the kids who were logged as hospitalised for Covid were actually sick enough from the virus itself to need inpatient treatment for it.
The other 45% were likely hospitalised for something else and just happened to test positive for Covid.
Worth reading in full.
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I think you mean the true case fatality rate will go LOWER. That would be the case as the true number of infections is determined.
BBC radio More or Less last night (20/5) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000j949 had a very good piece on the risks around schools re-opening. (ie there are none!!)
I think more notice should be taken of this programme.. especially by the rest of the BBC. It is the only programme that actually looks into facts with any accuracy and without the usual BBC bias and prejudice. In fact a bit of an outlier.. Surprised that the management let them get away with it.
also last night’s programme had interesting piece about the german covid figures.
The behaviour of teachers in the COVID-19 crisis is actually very easy to understand, even if it’s infuriating to see the consequences. Most teachers exist in an environment where they are permanently terrified of being accused by anyone higher up the chain, or a parent, of falling short in any one of a myriad different ways. This includes anything to do with a student’s welfare or safety even where the allegations are ridiculous or even invented. Every trip, every activity is preceded by laborious risk assessment processes, and mountains of paperwork. However exemplary a teacher’s career record it can be destroyed in a few minutes by a single malicious or a mischievous allegation, or a genuine but innocent mistake however minor. I know of one instance where a teacher with an outstanding record stretching over decades inadvertently uploaded to the school website some confidential information. He realised his mistake almost instantly and removed the material straightaway. Nonetheless the school management, anxious to reduce its complement of expensive older teachers gave him the choice of resigning or facing a disciplinary investigation on the grounds that he had compromised safeguarding. He left teaching.
School hierarchies are byzantine too. I did work in one for nine years, and my wife taught for 35 years, so I know about all this from firsthand.
This has created a culture where initiative is stifled and where taking responsibility for anything is something not only many teachers try to avoid, but are also even told to by unions. As I recall unions discouraged anything to do with school trips on the basis that teachers were expected to take excessive responsibility. Of course many teachers do resist and go ahead but they still fall over themselves to cover their backs.
The net effect is that confronted with this crisis a lot of teachers are literally paralyzed with fear – not necessarily of the virus (which is how it’s being expressed) – but of being accused of anything. They already were paranoid. These primary schools packed with taped off areas and showcase COVID arrangements are just that: they’re there primarily to showcase the headteacher and teachers as being beyond reproach. The whole thing is designed to deflect allegations and accusations and just reflects an elaboration of what schools are like now anyway. In that sense it’s part of a culture of competitive virtue-signalling but now it’s taking schools into an environment where they will literally be unable to fulfil their remit by trying to operate these new zero-risk set-ups.
Such an accurate assessment!
The first comment I received from the staff at our pre-school was “What’s going to happen to us if a child gets sick? We are going to be blamed.”
Christine Brett’s article is reassuring and inspires confidence.