Children rarely transmit COVID-19, doctors write in new commentary
Schools can reopen in fall, they say, if safety guidelines are observed
and community transmission is low

Date:
July 10, 2020
Source:
University of Vermont
Summary:
A commentary published in the journal Pediatrics concludes that
children infrequently transmit COVID-19 to each other or to adults
and that many schools, provided they follow appropriate social
distancing guidelines and take into account rates of transmission
in their community, can and should reopen in the fall.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
A commentary published in the journal Pediatrics, the official
peer-reviewed journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, concludes
that children infrequently transmit Covid-19 to each other or to adults
and that many schools, provided they follow appropriate social distancing guidelines and take into account rates of transmission in their community,
can and should reopen in the fall.


==========================================================================
The authors, Benjamin Lee, M.D. and William V. Raszka, Jr., M.D., are
both pediatric infectious disease specialists on the faculty of the
University of Vermont's Larner College of Medicine. Dr. Raszka is an
associate editor of Pediatrics.

The authors of the commentary, titled "COVID-19 Transmission and
Children: The Child Is Not to Blame," base their conclusions on a new
study published in the current issue of Pediatrics, "COVID-19 in Children
and the Dynamics of Infection in Families," and four other recent studies
that examine Covid-19 transmission by and among children.

In the new Pediatrics study, Klara M. Posfay-Barbe, M.D., a faculty member
at University of Geneva's medical school, and her colleagues studied the households of 39 Swiss children infected with Covid-19. Contact tracing revealed that in only three (8%) was a child the suspected index case,
with symptom onset preceding illness in adult household contacts.

In a recent study in China, contact tracing demonstrated that, of the
68 children with Covid-19 admitted to Qingdao Women's and Children's
Hospital from January 20 to February 27, 2020, 96% were household
contacts of previously infected adults. In another study of Chinese
children, nine of 10 children admitted to several provincial hospitals
outside Wuhan contracted Covid-19 from an adult, with only one possible child-to-child transmission, based on the timing of disease onset.

In a French study, a boy with Covid-19 exposed over 80 classmates at
three schools to the disease. None contracted it. Transmission of other respiratory diseases, including influenza transmission, was common at
the schools.

In a study in New South Wales, nine infected students and nine staff
across 15 schools exposed a total of 735 students and 128 staff to
Covid-19. Only two secondary infections resulted, one transmitted by an
adult to a child.

"The data are striking," said Dr. Raszka. "The key takeaway is that
children are not driving the pandemic. After six months, we have a
wealth of accumulating data showing that children are less likely to
become infected and seem less infectious; it is congregating adults who
aren't following safety protocols who are responsible for driving the
upward curve." Rising cases among adults and children in Texas childcare facilities, which have seen 894 Covid-19 cases among staff members and
441 among children in 883 child care facilities across the state, have
the potential to be misinterpreted, Dr. Raszka said. He has not studied
the details of the outbreak.

"There is widespread transmission of Covid-19 in Texas today, with many
adults congregating without observing social distancing or wearing masks,"
he said.

"While we don't yet know the dynamics of the outbreak, it is unlikely
that infants and children in daycare are driving the surge. Based on the evidence, it's more plausible that adults are passing the infection to
the children in the vast majority of cases." Additional support for
the notion that children are not significant vectors of the disease
comes from mathematical modeling, the authors say. Models show that community-wide social distancing and widespread adoption of facial cloth coverings are far better strategies for curtailing disease spread, and
that closing schools adds little. The fact that schools have reopened
in many Western European countries and in Japan without seeing a rise
in community transmissions bears out the accuracy of the modeling.

Reopening schools in a safe manner this fall is important for the healthy development of children, the authors say. "By doing so, we could minimize
the potentially profound adverse social, developmental, and health costs
that our children will continue to suffer until an effective treatment
or vaccine can be developed and distributed, or failing that, until we
reach herd immunity," the paper concludes.


========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Vermont. Original
written by Jeffrey R.

Wakefield. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal References:
1. Benjamin Lee, William V. Raszka. COVID-19 Transmission and
Children: The
Child Is Not to Blame. Pediatrics, 2020; e2020004879 DOI: 10.1542/
peds.2020-004879
2. Klara M. Posfay-Barbe, Noemie Wagner, Magali Gauthey, Dehlia
Moussaoui,
Natasha Loevy, Alessandro Diana, Arnaud G. L'Huillier. COVID-19
in Children and the Dynamics of Infection in Families. Pediatrics,
2020; e20201576 DOI: 10.1542/peds.2020-1576 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200710100934.htm

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