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 Health experts are keeping an eye on coronavirus infections among
kids and teenagers as officials struggle with the thorny question of
whether to reopen schools for in-person classes, adopt a virtual
learning model or a hybrid of the two.
President Donald Trump, who is seeking a second term in the White
House in a Nov. 3 election, has pushed states to allow students to
physically return to classrooms, but health officials have expressed
caution about doing so in areas where cases have been rising
sharply.
The new report by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the
Children's Hospital Association found that more than 338,000
children have tested positive for COVID-19 since the onset of the
U.S. epidemic, with 97,078 new cases reported in the July 16-30
period.
Most of the new infections in this group occurred in states in the
U.S. South and West, according to the report, which was based on
data from 49 states, New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto
Rico and Guam.
It did not give a reason for the recent spike. Testing for the novel
coronavirus overall has risen in the United States and concerns
about children as possible spreaders of the virus have been sparked
by new studies showing they can catch it.
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The American Academy of Pediatrics noted the data showed that severe illness due
to COVID-19 appears to be rare among children. The U.S. Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention also has said that children who get the virus are less
likely to have severe symptoms.
The CDC recently updated its guidance to recommend that schools reopen to some
degree unless their communities were experiencing an uncontrolled or high rate
of transmission of the virus.
Some cities including Chicago and Los Angeles plan to start the school year with
online classes, while New York City, once the epicenter of the U.S. epidemic,
plans to have at least some in-person learning in all its school districts in
the fall.
Children account for a tiny fraction of the more than 162,000 people who have
died from COVID-19 in the United States. More than 5 million people in the
country have been infected with the virus, representing about one-quarter of the
total worldwide cases.
(Reporting by Mrinalika Roy in Bengaluru; Editing by Paul Simao)
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