April 18, 2020, 5:43 am | Read time: 4 minutes
Much has been debated in recent days: Should schools and daycares reopen, or is the risk of accelerating the COVID-19 wave too great? Initial data suggests that children may be less affected by the virus—and rarely fall ill. Are they (in some way) immune?
Initial data analyses indicate that children are less affected by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 than adults. Researchers led by Kári Stefánsson from the Icelandic company deCODE Genetics in Reykjavik examined around 13,000 people in population-based tests.
Among them, 0.6 percent of women and 0.9 percent of men were infected. There was not a single positive case among children under 10 years old, while 0.8 percent of those aged 10 and older were infected, according to the journal New England Journal of Medicine.
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Few Infected Children Among COVID-19 Cases
Iceland had implemented measures against the spread of the virus, such as banning gatherings of more than 20 people, but schools and kindergartens remained largely open with restrictions.
Previous analyses had already pointed to a relatively low involvement of children in the infection process. According to the EU health authority ECDC, children accounted for only a very small proportion of recorded COVID-19 cases. Only about one percent of cases were recorded in children under 10 years old, and four percent in those aged 10 to 19. Children seem just as likely to be infected as adults but have a significantly lower risk than adults of developing symptoms or becoming seriously ill. There are still uncertainties in assessing to what extent infected children with few or no symptoms can infect others.
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In a comparison of COVID-19 and influenza in March, the World Health Organization (WHO) stated that, unlike with the flu, children are likely not significant drivers of transmission in the COVID-19 pandemic. Initial evaluations showed that children are less affected than adults and rarely develop noticeable symptoms. Preliminary data also suggest that children primarily contract the virus from adults. Additionally, adults may hardly contract the virus from children.
Faster Herd Immunity Through Children?
This aligns with what the renowned and now nationally known virologist Prof. Dr. Christian Drosten, head of virology at Berlin’s Charité, reported in the latest episode of his NDR podcast “Coronavirus Update”. He pointed to the possibility that children might be excluded from the number of people needing to be infected (keyword: herd immunity):
“We know from other coronavirus diseases, especially MERS, that children are not only hardly affected but also hardly infected. Now, of course, the question is: Is it the same with this disease, that they not only don’t show symptoms and therefore don’t stand out in the statistics, but that they are somehow resistant in a certain way and that they don’t need to be counted in the number of people needing to be infected? So what is 70 percent of the population? Can we already consider the 20 percent of children as done because they don’t get infected? In reality, only 50 percent of the population needs to be infected? This is a big gap, which can also be seen as a big hope.”
There is hope for an (hopefully soon) end to the COVID-19 crisis. But there is also the obvious need to find answers to the many open questions as quickly as possible. This includes: What role do children play in the spread of COVID-19?