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SINGAPORE – Children under the age of five are at the lowest risk of being infected by Covid-19 than adults, as they may be more resistant to the virus, according to a home transmission study conducted by the KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital (KKH ).
According to study results released on Wednesday (October 21), there was a 6.1 percent transmission rate among children exposed to Covid-19 cases out of 137 households surveyed.
Rates of adult-to-child transmission were similar regardless of the child’s gender, and the risk of secondary infection in children was higher if the Covid-19 index patient was the child’s mother.
The youngest group of infected children, ages zero to four, had the lowest infection rates at 1.3%, compared to 8.1% of older children ages five to nine and 9, 8% of children between 10 and 16 years old. years, after exposure to a household member with Covid-19.
Dr. Yung Chee Fu, a consultant with the KKH Infectious Diseases Service, said this trend may be due to “increased expression of angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 receptors (the receptor that Sars-CoV-2 uses for entry of the host) in the nasal epithelium with increasing age, therefore, it is possible that younger children are more resistant to Sars-CoV-2 infection at the cellular level. “
About 4 in 10 children were asymptomatic
A separate study of 39 children infected with Covid-19 between January and May found that 38.5 percent of children remained asymptomatic, while those who were symptomatic had no worse outcome compared to asymptomatic cases.
There was a higher proportion of younger children exhibiting symptoms compared to older children, with 75% of children aged zero to four presenting symptoms compared to 53% of children aged five to nine and 64% in the age group 10-16 years.
Common symptoms include a mild fever, runny nose, sore throat, diarrhea, and loss of smell or taste.
Higher viral loads were found in the nasopharynx of symptomatic children, indicating the possibility of increased transmissibility.
However, both asymptomatic and symptomatic children had experienced peak viral loads that occurred around day two or three of their diagnosis, suggesting viral shedding and transmission in the presymptomatic phase.
The 39 children surveyed stayed in the hospital for an average of 15 days. They had a mild course of the disease and have already been discharged.
Young children may not be the main drivers of COVID-19 transmission in preschools
Examining children of three possible Sars-CoV-2 incident transmissions in educational settings (one high school and two preschool) did not detect any evidence of Sars-CoV-2 transmission among children.
Close contacts of two Covid-19 positive students, one from a preschool and the other from a high school, had tested negative for Covid-19.
In contrast, 16 adult members of the staff of a second preschool and 11 cases of their household contacts tested positive for Covid-19, while none of the children had tested positive for Covid-19 after a comprehensive examination.
Dr. Yung noted that “the clinical manifestation of Covid-19 in children has been reported to range from asymptomatic to moderate rather than severe, but the burden of disease and pediatric role in community transmission have remained largely unknown. “.
A review by the hospital also found that non-invasive testing methods, such as buccal swabs, where DNA is collected from the inside of a person’s cheek, are not enough to detect Sars-CoV-2 in children.
Similarly, saliva tests also found lower sensitivity and lower viral loads in children, making nasopharyngeal (back of the nose) and oropharyngeal (back of the throat) swabs the best practice for evaluate Covid-19 in children.
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