Over 1.6 million US children have had coronavirus infections since the pandemic began, pediatricians say

Nearly 180,000 children in the United States were diagnosed with coronavirus infections from November 26 to December 10, bringing the cumulative total to over 1.6 million US cases since the pandemic began, the American Academy of Pediatrics said Tuesday.

Children account for a little more than 12% of all Covid-19 cases in the states that report cases by age.

The group, which represents pediatricians, noted there was a 23% increase in child Covid-19 cases during that period. Those dates include the Thanksgiving Day weekend, in which over 4 million people traveled for the holiday.

Long-term impact on children unknown

Severe illness due to Covid-19 is still relatively rare among children. Between 0.2% and 4.4% of all children with Covid-19 ended up in the hospital, depending on the state, and children accounted for at most 0.21% of all Covid-19 deaths. Fifteen states reported no child deaths in this time period.

The association said there still is an urgent need to collect more data on the long-term impacts of the pandemic on children, including how Covid-19 impacts them physically and mentally.

The count of cases is also not complete, because not all states report data in the same way. These numbers come from 49 states, New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam.

Higher chance of testing positive outside home

Even among children and teens, encountering people with Covid-19 and attending gatherings with people outside of their household can be associated with an increased likelihood of testing positive for the disease, a new study has suggested.

Yet consistently wearing face masks and social distancing can prevent the spread of Covid-19, according to the study published Tuesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Attending in-person school or child care “was not associated with increased likelihood” of a positive Covid-19 test, the study also found.

The researchers — from the University of Mississippi, Mississippi State Department of Health and CDC Covid-19 Response Team — examined data on 397 children, younger than 18, who were tested for Covid-19 in Mississippi between September and November.

Mask wearing inside schools

Those who received positive test results were more likely to have had reported being in close contact with someone who had Covid-19, and they were less likely to have had reported consistent mask wearing by students and staff inside their school, the study reported.

Among the 236 children in the study who attended child care or school in the two weeks before testing, the “parents of 64% of case-patients and 76% of control participants reported that their child and all staff members wore masks inside the facility,” the researchers wrote in the study.

The researchers also found that among all of the children and adolescents in the study who tested positive for Covid-19, 69% reported that they had been in close contact with someone who had the disease compared with 42% of the study participants who tested negative.

The study has some limitations, including that data on mask wearing were reported by parents and more research is needed to determine whether similar findings would emerge among a larger group of children outside of Mississippi.