US reports 25,000 weekly child Covid cases

Washington: Almost 25,000 child Covid-19 cases were reported in the US in the week ending October 27, according to the latest report by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the Children’s Hospital Association.

Nearly 14.9 million children in the country have tested positive for Covid-19 since the onset of the pandemic, Xinhua news agency quoted the report as saying.

Nearly 116,000 of these cases have been added in the past four weeks.

For the week ending October 27, the portion of child Covid-19 cases was 11.1 per cent.

Reported cases are likely a substantial undercount of Covid-19 cases among children, said the report.

There is a need to collect more age-specific data to assess the severity of illness related to new variants as well as potential longer-term effects, said the AAP.

“It is important to recognise there are immediate effects of the pandemic on children’s health, but importantly we need to identify and address the long-lasting impacts on the physical, mental, and social well-being of this generation of children and youth,” the Association added.