In Kids, The Risk Of COVID-19 And The Flu Are Similar — But The Risk Perception Isn't
The risk of serious COVID-19 illness in children is comparable to their risk from the flu, but many parents seem more concerned about coronavirus. The issue of risk perception has a lot do with it.
The CDC's new mask recommendations have left some parents concerned about kids too young to be vaccinated. Is it safe to take them to the store? Will a maskless person spread the coronavirus to a vaccinated parent who could then give it to a child? And if so, what's that risk? Well, as NPR's Richard Harris reports, the risk to children turns out to be extremely low - comparable to the flu.
RICHARD HARRIS, BYLINE: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention made a strong statement about the effectiveness of vaccines when it decided that fully vaccinated people don't need to wear masks in most circumstances. Dr. Paul Offit, who runs the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, says that's mostly good news.
HARRIS: Even a vaccinated parent can occasionally get infected with the coronavirus. There's also a small risk that the virus can pass to an unvaccinated child, and that child has an extremely small risk of getting seriously ill. To date, out of more than 74 million children in the United States, there have been about 300 COVID deaths and a few thousand serious illnesses. Hospitalization numbers look worse, but Dr. Roshni Mathew at Stanford's Children's Hospital says those numbers are inflated.
