According to the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association, as of October 1, more than 657,000 children and teens across the United States had tested positive for the coronavirus.
That number is just over 10% of the more than 7 million coronavirus cases in the country so far, but it’s likely underreported because it relied on state data that is inconsistently collected.
The researchers looking into the long-term effects of Covid-19 are taking notice of how long-haul symptoms are affecting children.point 237 |
These people include a team at DePaul University in Chicago, who have launched two separate surveys, one for adults and the other for children, to help gather data on how patients are faring longer term after being diagnosed with Covid-19.point 200 | point 200 | 1
Leonard Jason, a professor of psychology at DePaul and director of the Center for Community Research, who also leads that study says that long-haul children may be the most important group to research for several reasons.
“Kids are often more defenseless and don’t have the age, maturity, or resources to stick up for themselves,” Jason said. “And kids are less complex in a lot of ways, so there are fewer extraneous factors.”
Jason has spent much of his career studying post-viral symptoms across a range of diseases and trying to extract lessons from the aftermath of past epidemics.
“If you look at all the pandemics from the Spanish flu on down, a certain number of people never get better,” Jason added. “At least 10% six months later seem to still be having symptoms. With Covid-19, I think the rates could be very much higher.”
Jason and his team just completed a four-year study seeking to determine how many college students who contract mononucleosis ultimately develop chronic fatigue syndrome. He sees many of the same concerns with longer-term illnesses children with Covid-19 might develop.
“I fear that a lot of the people will fall through the cracks,” he said.