The highly contagious strain of COVID-19, known as B.1.1.7, is now in all 50 states – and the data suggest that it may affect children more than people realize.
Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, recently said Boston 25 News that B.1.1.7 made him reconsider his position on the reopening of schools for personal learning. “It’s a very different virus in terms of what it does epidemiologically,” he said. “I think the school openings today will significantly improve the transmission of B.1.1.7 in our communities, and I predict that we will review this issue again within a few weeks after we have had a significant shipment.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) cites B.1.1.7 as a “variant of concern”, which means that researchers are keeping a close eye on it. The variant appears to spread easily and rapidly, and this can cause a greater risk of death than previous variants.
According to CDC data, B.1.1.7 is now the most widespread variant in the United States, accounting for 32 percent of cases in the country.
Other data suggest that the variant is more likely to infect children. A report published in the British medical journal found that more than 50,000 Israeli children tested positive for the virus in January, which was more than any month during the country’s first and second waves of the virus. In Italy, 10 percent of the town of Corzano tested positive for COVID-19 on February 3 – and 60 percent of them were infants and primary school children, who then transmitted the virus to adults.
A research article published in the journal Science also found that children are more likely to be infected with B.1.1.7 than other variants of concern.
But … what does this mean for kids in the US?
It is difficult to say with certainty, says dr. Juan Salazar, a pediatric infectious disease specialist and chief physician at Connecticut Children’s, to Yahoo Life. “B.1.1.7 is more contagious, and lately there has been greater contact between children than there was six months to a year ago,” he says. “With that, the risk of spread is greater.”
In Michigan, which is currently experiencing a huge increase in cases – including those due to B.1.1.7 – COVID-19 cases among children aged 10 to 19 in the state rose by 133 percent last week compared to the four weeks before , according to the Detroit News.
“There are signals that children can disperse the British variant of COVID more easily than they disperse the initial stress,” said Dr. Lewis Nelson, Professor and Chair of Emergency Medicine at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School and Head of the Emergency Department at the University. Hospital, tells Yahoo Life. “This would mean that, without proper precautions, they could bring the variety system home or spread it to others in other places. This is of particular concern to many people, as returning to the classroom coupled with reducing social distance among the “The right conditions are recommended by the CDC. The disease in children still seems to be mild, but it is not without a small risk of serious consequences.”
The expert on infectious diseases, dr. Amesh A. Adalja, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, tells Yahoo Life that children are now more likely to get B.1.1.7 in the US simply because it is the dominant tribe that circulates. “If children become infected, and are B.1.1.7, they will get B.1.1.7,” he says.
But Dr. Richard Watkins, an infectious disease physician and professor of internal medicine at Northeast Ohio Medical University, tells Yahoo Life that there may be something different about the way stress affects children. The increase in B.1.1.7 cases in children may be related to a better binding in lung epithelial cells compared to other strains, ‘he says. (Epithelial cells provide a protective barrier in the lungs and help to initiate immune responses to viruses and other diseases.)
On the question of whether B.1.1.7 is more dangerous for children, it is difficult at this stage to say for sure, says dr. Daniel Ganjian, a pediatrician at Providence Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, California, to Yahoo Life. “Children may get B.1.1.7, but that doesn’t mean they get sicker from it,” he says. Salazar agrees. However, he points out: “When more children are infected, the risk is greater that more may end up in hospital.”
However, Salazar adds that in severe cases he has not seen an increase in children due to B.1.1.7 in his medical center. “This virus has affected children since the pandemic started, but I have not yet seen increases in children come through the ICU as a result of B.1.1.7,” he says.
As for Nelson, he is of the opinion that B.1.1.7 could only “be more transferable, and that children up to this point were merely a relatively protected host and could therefore serve as a larger reservoir.”
In general, experts urge parents to be diligent in keeping their children safe. Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC, said in a press release on Monday that young people have fueled COVID-19 cases across the country due to school reopening and youth sports. “We learn that many outbreaks in young people are related to youth sports and extracurricular activities. According to CDC guidance, these activities should be curtailed,” she said.
“We are concerned about the outbreak of schools related to extracurricular activities,” says Adalja. “We need to be much more careful with extracurricular activities.”
Watkins urges parents to continue to practice good COVID-19 safety protocols for themselves and their families, such as mask wear, social distance and careful hand hygiene. “It’s easy to let us down with the vaccine spreading more widely, but children obviously can’t get vaccines right now,” he says.
Salazar agrees that it is important for families to remain diligent in preventing COVID-19. “If we can do that and continue with vaccinations, we will hopefully have a quieter summer,” he says.
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