In the entire corona epidemic, never before have so many small children ended up in hospital with a covid infection. The age group between 0 and 5 years made up 8.4 percent of the number of hospital admissions last week. According to Steven Van Gucht, there is no reason to panic. “The virus is circulating more than ever, and children are not vaccinated: that explains everything. Moreover, serious complications are very exceptional.”
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According to the latest figures from Sciensano, 14 children under the age of five were hospitalized with Covid infection in the week from December 27 to January 2. This figure has never been so high among newborns, toddlers and preschoolers. They accounted for 8.4 percent of all hospital admissions. Since the number of infections has risen sharply since last week, it can be expected that more children have been hospitalized since then.
The virus has never circulated as hard as it does now, and it mainly affects unvaccinated people. It is logical that the number of children in hospital will rise.
Experts abroad have already suggested that the omikron variant might make children sicker than the previous variants, but Steven Van Gucht does not believe that. “I haven’t seen any evidence of that yet. It’s pretty simple: the virus has never circulated as hard as it does now, and it mostly affects unvaccinated people. It is logical that the number of children in hospital will rise. We also do not identify a different clinical picture compared to previous waves. Most remain on observation for a few days, mainly because of a high fever. Some children are also admitted with a disease other than Covid, but turn out to be infected and thus end up in the corona statistics. Complications are still very rare.”
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