More Than 600,000 Child Cases Reported Of COVID-19, But Severe Illness Is ‘Rare’

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September 29th, 2020

Penny Brown, 2, is held by her mother, Heather Brown, as her nose is lightly swabbed during a test for COVID-19 in Seattle last month. A survey of state health department website data shows severe illness and death among child cases of COVID-19 is rare.

Elaine Thompson / AP

In a survey of data published on the health department websites of 49 states, New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam, a total of 624,890 child cases of COVID-19 were reported from the start of the pandemic through September 24, or 10.5% of all cases in states reporting infections according to age.

A smaller subset of states reported hospitalizations and mortality by age. The data from those states indicate “COVID-19-associated hospitalization and death is uncommon in children,” according to the survey.

The survey was compiled by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association. In announcing the survey, published Tuesday, the organizations said “[s]tate-level reports are the best publicly available data on child COVID-19 cases in the United States.”

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