Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Delta Variant Is Chasing Down Anyone Who's Unvaccinated — Including Kids
NPR: Nearly 94,000 Kids Got COVID-19 Last Week. They Were 15% Of All New Cases
Coronavirus cases among children are rising at a time when the highly infectious delta variant is advancing across the United States at a rapid clip. New state-level data analyzed by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children's Hospital Association shows that children accounted for roughly 15% of all newly reported COVID-19 cases across the nation for the week ending on Aug. 5. Nearly 94,000 child cases of COVID-19 were recorded during that period, a 31% increase over the roughly 72,000 cases reported a week earlier. In the week before then, there were 39,000 new child cases. (Hernandez, 8/10)
Fox News: Rising Kids’ Hospital Admissions Stirs Alarm Ahead Of School Year
Growing numbers of pediatric hospital admissions are stirring alarm as respiratory illnesses coincide and younger children remain ineligible to receive COVID-19 vaccines amid the start of the school year. Hospital admissions among kids have seen an approximate four-fold increase over the last month, federal data suggests. Children's hospitals across the country confirmed increasing numbers of pediatric inpatient volumes, including Nashville-based Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, Children’s Hospital Colorado and Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. Texas Children's Hospital also reported an uptick in COVID-19 cases among younger residents, with the delta variant behind over 80% of new cases since July 1. (Rivas, 8/10)
USA Today: US Hospitals Overwhelmed By COVID Spike In Children, Unvaccinated
Texas hospitals tallied more than 10,000 COVID patients for the first time since early February. The state has only 329 staffed beds for intensive care among 8,283 hospital beds left for about 30 million people, according to state health data released Tuesday. And hospital admissions have tripled in the last month among children 17 and younger, Dr. Desmar Walkes, Austin-Travis County health authority, told Travis County commissioners on Tuesday. In June, 11 children were hospitalized with COVID-19 and by July that has more than tripled to 34. A majority of cases, Walkes reported, are among children between 10 and 18 years old. (Aspegren, 8/11)
Louisville Courier Journal: More Kids With COVID-19 Being Admitted To Norton Children's Hospital
Norton Healthcare is seeing a jump in children hospitalized with COVID-19, along with a surge in adult patients admitted with the virus, as the delta variant continues to drive up infection rates in Kentucky. On Tuesday, Norton Children's Hospital had 10 pediatric patients with COVID-19, four in intensive care and two on ventilators — in contrast to many days in June when it had no children hospitalized with the virus. Kentucky Children's Hospital in Lexington reported two children hospitalized with COVID-19 Tuesday. (Yetter, 8/10)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: COVID-19 Cases In Children Raise Alarms In Milwaukee County
COVID-19 cases among children 18 and younger are on the rise in Milwaukee County, medical experts say, with 10% of hospitalizations being tied to children. Between July 28 and Aug. 3, there were 102 hospitalizations in the county — ten of those patients were children, according to Darren Rausch, director of the Greenfield Health Department. He described it as a "pretty substantial increase." "Previous variants, prior to delta, were not hospitalizing kids at such an alarming rate, but it's certainly something we are seeing consistently both here in the state of Wisconsin and in other parts of the country," Rausch said during a virtual briefing Tuesday. (Swales, Bentley and Dirr, 8/10)
CNN: Here's Why Now Is One Of The Most Dangerous Times Of The Pandemic For Children, Expert Says
Students heading back to the classroom for the new school year will be contending with one of the most dangerous times in the pandemic for children. And officials will have to consider many measures to keep them safe from Covid-19, an expert said. "We have the more contagious Delta variant, we have surges and we have so many adults letting down their guard, not wearing masks, not getting vaccinated," Dr. Leana Wen told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Tuesday. "That's contributing to this really dangerous environment for children." (Holcombe, 8/11)
The Atlantic: Why The Delta Variant Is A Serious Threat To Kids
Two and a half weeks ago, as the next school year approached, a pediatric cardiologist from Louisiana headed into the Georgia mountains with her husband, their three young children, and their extended family. It was, in many ways, a fairly pandemic-sanctioned vacation: All nine adults in attendance were fully vaccinated. The group spent most of the trip outdoors, biking, swimming, and hiking. Then, on the last night of the outing—July 27, the same day the CDC pivoted back to asking vaccinated people to mask up indoors—one parent started feeling sick. A test soon confirmed a mild breakthrough case of COVID-19. None of the other adults caught the coronavirus on the trip, the cardiologist told me, which she points to as “total proof that the vaccine worked.” (The Atlantic agreed not to name the cardiologist to protect her family’s privacy.) But within a week, six of the eight kids on the trip—all of them too young to be eligible for vaccines—had newly diagnosed coronavirus infections as well. (Wu, 8/10)
