As COVID-19 cases increase among adults, they have also increased in children, along with cases of a new inflammatory syndrome.
At least seven California children have died from COVID-19 since the pandemic began, more than 350,000 kids have tested positive for the virus and the number of youngsters diagnosed with a new, rare inflammatory syndrome continues to spread.
All of these stats are on the rise just as a new highly contagious strain of the virus is worrying parents and experts alike and as the state tries to move toward reopening schools next month.
“We are at a critical time because the overall number of cases of COVID are increasing so much,” said Dr. Jackie Szmuszkovicz, pediatric cardiologist at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. “We are seeing more children with MIS-C the last few weeks following that big increase (of cases) in the community.”
MIS-C, or Multi-system Inflammatory Syndrome in Children, is the name of a new inflammatory syndrome that afflicts a small number of kids three to six weeks after they experienced coronavirus, even if they had mild or no symptoms at all.
While children have been spared some of the worst effects of the coronavirus and the high death toll seen among adults, the youngest Californians are still at-risk, especially given the current surge. Kids usually experience mild to no symptoms of the infection but it’s what happens to a small number of them a few weeks afterward that has doctors worried. Pediatric doctors are preparing for a wave of inflammatory syndrome cases three to six weeks after the current surge especially with the new more transmissible variant, said Szmuszkovicz.
Kids do get sick
Although severe COVID-19 has been uncommon in kids, there has been a tiny uptick in more serious cases recently, said Dr. Erica Lawson, a pediatric rheumatologist at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital San Francisco.
“We are seeing more kids on the far end of the curve, who are sick enough to be admitted,” she said. “It’s because of the higher numbers in the community. If you have a prevalence in the community the more cases you have the more severe cases you will have.”
Dr. Behnoosh Afghani, a pediatric infectious disease expert at UCI Health in Orange County, hopes that the spread of the vaccine will start to decrease the number of infections in adults and therefore also contribute to fewer infections among children. While children under 16 cannot be vaccinated, if more adults around them are vaccinated it will increase protection for children, she said.
California’s Department of Public Health reports that at least six minors have died from COVID-19 since the pandemic began and one more died in Los Angeles that has not yet made the state’s count, according to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.
The state does not identify which of the children had the inflammatory syndrome and how many had COVID-19 at the time of their death. It is also not releasing information about where they lived or their ages, although there has been a confirmed death in Orange County, one in the Central Valley and two in Los Angeles.
A rare post-COVID syndrome is affecting kids
MIS-C, the rare inflammatory syndrome, was discovered last year in children who had previously had coronavirus. Originally it was thought to be Kawasaki disease, a post-infection syndrome that afflicts young children, but physicians connected the new syndrome to COVID-19. It is marked by overwhelming inflammation in the body that sometimes impacts major organs and can lead to heart failure. Children develop a fever, some have abdominal pain, vomiting or diarrhea, rash, are severely fatigued and have red eyes.
So far, 176 children in California have been diagnosed with the inflammatory syndrome.
“These kids develop a lot of inflammation in their bloodstream and could have multiple organ systems affected, including the heart,” said Lawson. The San Francisco hospital and its campus in Oakland have treated about 20 children so far with the syndrome but have had no deaths, she said. Most of the children have been Latino.
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