CDC report shows racial disparities in COVID-19 children

One of the reports for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention examined COVID-19 children in need of hospitalization. Hispanic children were found to be eight times more likely to be hospitalized than white children, and black children were five times more likely to be hospitalized.

The second report examined cases of rare virus-related syndromes in children. It found that almost three-quarters of children with the syndrome were Hispanic or black, well above their representation in the general population.

The coronavirus exposed racial fractures in the US healthcare system as blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans were hospitalized at a much higher rate than other groups and were killed by COVID-19.

On the other hand, the impact of the virus on children is a political issue. President Donald Trump and several other officials have urged them to reopen their schools, a step that will allow more parents to return to work and the economy to recover.

Relation: A boy who survived a hospital-recognized COVID-related illness

On Wednesday, Facebook deleted a post by Trump as violating its policy on disseminating false information about the coronavirus. The article features links to Fox News videos, where Trump says children are “substantially immune” to the virus.

The majority of coronavirus cases and deaths are in adults, and children are considered unlikely to have serious symptoms when infected. Of the nearly 5 million cases reported in the United States as of Wednesday, about 265,000 were children under 17-about 5%. Of the more than 156,000 deaths reported at the time, 77 were children, or about 0.05%.

However, Friday’s CDC report is “intuitive” to remind some children of serious illness and death, according to a researcher focusing on health disparities at the University of Minnesota. Carrie Henning Smith said.

“From these studies and other new studies, it’s clear that children are not immune,” she said. “Children can pass COVIDs and may be affected as well.”

She said the study should give community leaders a pause on opening schools. “We really need to be really careful. We’re potentially talking about putting children in a dangerous situation,” Henningsmith said.

Chantel Saras, a Hispanic girl from the farming town of Immokalee in Florida, was hospitalized at COVID-19 for over 50 days. After taking a picture with a diploma for high school graduation, 17 years old became ill.

At one point, her 41-year-old mother, Erika Juarez, was told to say goodbye to her one daughter.

“This was the most horrifying thing I’ve ever had,” said Juarez, who works for a shipping warehouse. “She had no oxygen in her body. This affected all the organs in her body.”

According to Juárez, Saras has no underlying illness and none of the family members got sick, so it’s still unclear how she got infected. The teen was eventually fitted with a machine that added oxygen to the blood before pumping it into the body, a last resort to save her life. She left the hospital about three weeks ago and is now recovering at home.

“They keep saying that she’s a miracle,” she said. “She was so motivated that she recovered fast.”

The first CDC report released on Friday was based on 14 state cases. Researchers counted 576 hospitalizations for children from March 1st to July 25th. At least twelve were sick enough to need a machine to help them breathe. One died.

The hospitalization rate for Hispanic children was approximately 16.4 per 100,000. Black children were 10.5 per 100,000 and white children were 2.1 per 100,000.

Like adults, many hospitalized children had pre-existing health problems such as obesity, chronic lung disease, and preterm birth in infants.

Several possible factors could explain the gap, said Cyrus Shahpar, who oversees nonprofit data and infectious disease prevention efforts for advocacy groups called Vital Strategies.

The majority of Hispanic and black children may go to the hospital emergency room when ill. This may be due to difficulties in entering the clinic or making payments. He suggested that lack of regular access to health care could lead to more serious illnesses.

The second CDC report focuses on 570 children diagnosed with a rare condition, which CDC calls a multisystem inflammatory syndrome or MIS-C in children. 10 of them died.

Some children with this syndrome have symptoms similar to Kawasaki disease. This is another rare childhood condition that can cause swelling and heart problems. Other symptoms include fever, abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhea, neck pain, rash, red eyes, or extreme fatigue.

“The underlying problem that causes MIS-C seems to be a malfunction of the immune system,” said Dr. Ermias Belay, who heads the CDC team investigating the MIS-C case.

When the immune system encounters the virus, it overdrives, releasing chemicals that can damage various organs, he added.

In this study, many patients with this condition had serious complications such as heart inflammation, shock, and kidney damage. Almost two-thirds of all cases were admitted to the intensive care unit, with an average length of stay in the ICU of 5 days.

The CDC report covers illnesses that began in mid-February to mid-July. Forty states reported cases.

Reportedly, 13% of children with this condition were white, more than 40% were Hispanic and 33% were black. Population estimates show that about half of all children in the United States are white, about 25% are Hispanic, and about 14% are black.

Scientists are still learning about the condition. Experts say that genetics has nothing to do with why a racial or ethnic group is more likely to get the virus, becomes a serious illness, and therefore dies. But it’s still unclear whether inheritance is involved in childhood inflammatory conditions, Sharper and Belay said.

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Contributed by Adriana Gomez Licon, Associated Press writer in Miami.

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The Associated Press Health Sciences Department is supported by the Science Education Department of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. AP is solely responsible for all content.

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The story has been corrected and Shahpar’s partnership with Vital Strategies instead of Resolve to Save Lifes, and according to the CDC report, 10 instead of 8 children died of inflammatory disease. ..