In a few weeks, the variant Omicron has already caused thousands of new hospitalizations for Covid-19 of children in the United States, raising concerns about the many unvaccinated Americans under the age of 18 amid the new surge in coronavirus cases.
The seven-day average of daily hospitalizations for children between December 21 and 27 rose more than 58% in the country in the last week and reached 334, compared to 19% for all age groups, according to data from the Center for Control and Prevention of US Diseases (CDC).
Fewer than 25 percent of the 74 million Americans under age 18 are vaccinated, according to the CDC.
Ômicron cases are expected to spike even faster across the country when schools reopen next week, the end of the region’s winter holidays, experts warned.
Doctors say it’s too early to determine whether Ômicron causes less serious illness in children than other variants of micron. coronavirus, but that its extremely high transmissibility is a central factor that is increasing hospitalizations.
“It will infect more people and it is infecting more people. We see the numbers go up, we see the hospitalizations of children go up,” said Jennifer Nayak, an infectious disease specialist and pediatrician at the University of Rochester Medical Center.
“What we are seeing is that children under the age of 5 are still unvaccinated, so there is still a relatively large population of children who do not have pre-existing immunity to this virus,” Nayak said.
Even in New York City, which has one of the highest vaccination rates among USA, only about 40% of children and adolescents aged 5 to 17 years are fully immunized — adults are more than 80%, show municipal health data.
The US has not yet authorized any vaccines for children under the age of five.
Hospitalizations of persons aged 18 years or less in the city of Nova York increased from 22 in the week starting December 5th to 109 between December 19th and 23rd.
Children under the age of five accounted for almost half of all cases.
Statewide hospitalizations for people aged 18 and under went from 70 between Dec. 5 and 11 to 184 between Dec. 19 and 23.
Among young children, vaccination rates are much lower than in other age groups, as some families are hesitant to submit their younger members to a new one. vaccine.
Reference: CNN Brasil
