The World Health Organization has released its guidance on face masks for children, as students – in some parts of the country at least – return to their classrooms to begin the new school year. Children 5 years and younger should not be required to wear masks, says the WHO, because most of them are not able to put them on without help.
However, children aged 6 to 11 must wear masks under certain circumstances, including local infection rates, whether an adult is available to help them, and if they are exposed to older people or people with health conditions who have a higher are at risk of complications from the virus.
Children 12 and older would have to wear masks under the same conditions that adults would wear, with the standard social distancing guidelines, WHO said in its release.
WHO worked with UNICEF, the International Pediatric Association and other health organizations and experts to come up with the guidelines. Their findings emphasize that there is limited evidence on how the coronavirus is transmitted in children, but that some evidence shows that younger children “may have lower susceptibility to infection compared to adults,” but that this may vary with age. Older children can spread the virus more often than younger ones, according to WHO.
Furthermore, the WHO advises that the benefits of children wearing masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19 “should be weighed against potential harm associated with wearing masks, including possibility and discomfort, such as social and communication problems. . “
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, there were more than 75,000 new cases of coronavirus in children between July 30 and August 13, marking a 24 percent increase in the total. As of last month, more than 340,000 children had positive tests, roughly 9 percent of the total cases in the US.
Medical experts say there are very few medical reasons to prevent most people from wearing cloth face. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in a July 14 update that “cloth cover is a critical tool in the fight against COVID-19 that can reduce the spread of the disease,” adding that there is “increasing evidence that canvas cover helps prevent people who have COVID-19 from spreading the virus to others.”
