Children and COVID-19 Research Library

The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has collapsed health systems worldwide. In adults, the virus causes severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), while in children the disease seems to be milder, although a severe multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C) has been described. The aim was to describe and compare the characteristics of the severe COVID-19 disease in adults and children.

The COVID-19 pandemic has already had widespread effects on healthcare and health-related research worldwide. Early phase responses to the pandemic included restriction of clinical care and research to essential, time-sensitive and COVID-related activities in many institutions. With the re-introduction of clinical services, a number of strategies were imposed to minimize viral transmission to patients and healthcare personnel, such as strict limits on visitors/caregivers in pediatric inpatient facilities, which may have ethical implications on family-centered care. This study investigates consent rates for a clinical research study before and after implementation of a one-visitor policy at our children’s hospital.

This report provides six new insights on the unfolding crisis of care, along with PL+US highlighting the need for paid leave, policy changes that are intersectional and that account for and remedy existing inequalities, and better inclusion in decision-making of those individuals with a clear view of inequalities. This report is the first in a series of similar polls in the #HowICare Project which will be published by Oxfam International in four other countries: UK, Canada, Philippines, and Kenya.

Indigenous communities continue to be under-resourced, under-funded, and overly managed and policed (Greenwood et al., 2012), which has only been exacerbated by COVID-19. Our ability to choose our own path has been gated, leaving only a singular paved road toward the center; toward assimilation. For many, this is not a choice at all.

The COVID‐19 pandemic is the most serious global public health crisis since the 1918 influenza pandemic. This study is the first to assess its mental health impact across the lifespan in the United States in adolescents, adults, and health care workers.

The connection between civic space, civil society engagement and access to healthcare has been sharply highlighted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Civil society around the world has mobilised to bring attention to the needs of the most vulnerable people, and demonstrated the invaluable role it plays in addressing inequities and championing health for all. It is this commitment and zeal that will make UHC possible. This study sets out why accountability is vital to achieving universal health coverage. It also makes the case for protecting and expanding civic space as a way of encouraging civic engagement, resulting in accountability. We put forward recommendations to governments and global health actors to improve meaningful civil society inclusion in health governance.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the lockdown measures have forced clinicians across the world to look on telemedicine. Although migraine as such seems an ideal option for telemedicine, a systematic study reviewing feasibility, efficacy, and advantages of current advanced telecommunication technologies in children with migraine is lacking.

This study aimed to show the psychosocial impact of the start of the COVID‐19 pandemic on Dutch children with cancer in outpatient care and their caregivers (n = 799) using regular monitoring and screening outcomes. No differences were observed between the pre‐COVID‐19 and early‐COVID‐19 periods in health‐related quality of life and fatigue of children. Fewer caregivers were distressed during the COVID‐19 period than pre‐COVID‐19. In conclusion, the additional stress of COVID‐19 did not deteriorate psychosocial functioning of children with cancer and their caregivers.

COVID-19 constitutes the greatest crisis that high-income countries have seen in many generations. While many high-income countries experienced the global financial crisis of 2007–2008, or have had national recessions, the COVID-19 pandemic is much more than that. COVID-19 is a social and economic crisis, sparked by a protracted health crisis.

High-income countries have very limited experience of dealing with health crises, having their health and human services stretched beyond capacity, restricting the travel of their populations or having to close workplaces and schools – let alone experience of all of these things combined. These unique conditions create new and serious challenges for the economies and societies of all high-income countries. As these challenges evolve, children – as dependants – are among those at greatest risk of seeing their living standards fall and their personal well-being decline.

This new UNICEF Innocenti report explores how the social and economic impact of the pandemic is likely to affect children; the initial government responses to the crisis; and how future public policies could be optimized to better support children. 

COVID-19 constitutes the greatest crisis that high-income countries have seen in many generations. While many high-income countries experienced the global financial crisis of 2007–2008, or have had national recessions, the COVID-19 pandemic is much more than that. COVID-19 is a social and economic crisis, sparked by a protracted health crisis.

High-income countries have very limited experience of dealing with health crises, having their health and human services stretched beyond capacity, restricting the travel of their populations or having to close workplaces and schools – let alone experience of all of these things combined. These unique conditions create new and serious challenges for the economies and societies of all high-income countries. As these challenges evolve, children – as dependants – are among those at greatest risk of seeing their living standards fall and their personal well-being decline.

This new UNICEF Innocenti report explores how the social and economic impact of the pandemic is likely to affect children; the initial government responses to the crisis; and how future public policies could be optimized to better support children. 

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), resulting from infection with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), can affect pregnant women. Their newborns are at a higher risk of prematurity and early separation from their mothers, who may subsequently require intensive care for their own health. Although neonates born of mothers infected with SARS-CoV-2 during pregnancy are seemingly vulnerable to infection, studies have found that they were not at a high risk for severe infection and were very rarely affected by COVID-19. The presence of virus by real-time reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) has been reported in newborns before H 12 of life. In addition, antiviral immunoglobulin M has been detected in newborns at birth, suggesting that mother-to-infant viral transmission may occur. To date, however, only one case of vertical transmission has been clearly demonstrated. In several cases of early neonatal infection, postnatal contamination cannot be excluded. Moreover, only one case report found that the virus could pass from mother to infant through the mother’s breast milk.

There is limited information about newborns with confirmed or suspected COVID-19. Particularly in the hospital after delivery, clinicians have refined practices in order to prevent secondary infection. While guidance from international associations is continuously being updated, all facets of care of neonates born to women with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 are centerspecific, given local customs, building infrastructure constraints, and availability of protective equipment. Based on anecdotal reports from institutions in the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic close to our hospital, together with our limited experience, in anticipation of increasing numbers of exposed newborns, this study has developed a triage algorithm at the Penn State Hospital at Milton S. Hershey Medical Center that may be useful for other centers anticipating a similar surge.

Inequity in routine childhood vaccination coverage is well researched. Pandemics disrupt infrastructure and divert health resources from preventive care, including vaccination programmes, leading to increased vaccine preventable morbidity and mortality. COVID-19 control measures have resulted in coverage reductions. We conducted a rapid review of the impact of pandemics on existing inequities in routine vaccination coverage. PICO search framework: Population: children 0–18 years; Intervention/exposure: pandemic/epidemic; Comparison: inequality; Outcome: routine vaccination coverage. The review demonstrates a gap in the literature as none of the 29 papers selected for full-paper review from 1973 abstracts identified from searches met the inclusion criteria.

The knowledge of COVID-19 is evolving with new aspects of the disease continuing to emerge. Children and adolescents younger than 20 years of age constitute 10·6% of the total reported confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Pakistan as of July 8, 2020, with a mortality of 0·3% for those aged 10 years or younger and 0·5% for those aged 11–20 years. Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C), also known as paediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome temporally associated with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (PIMS-TS) is being reported primarily from Europe and the USA. Many of these children meet the criteria for complete or incomplete Kawasaki disease, but different clinical presentations of this inflammatory disorder are being reported. The ethnic origin of reported cases show that Black, Hispanic, and Asian children might be disproportionally affected. Similarly, unlike Kawasaki disease, these cases have occurred in older children and adolescents.

The COVID-19 pandemic has created the largest disruption of education systems in history, affecting nearly 1.6 billion school-age children in more than 190 countries. Already last year, 250 million school-age children being out of school, the world was facing a “learning crisis”. But now with the COVID-19 pandemic, this crisis could turn into a generational catastrophe. While many children will continue with their education once schools reopen, others may never return to school. Current estimates indicate that 24 million children will never return to the classroom and among those, disproportional number of girls. To avert this crisis, we need to reimagine how we deliver good quality and inclusive education to the world children. Among other things, this calls for urgent investments in school health and nutrition programmes and create the conditions for children to lead healthy lives. This also includes health and nutrition literacy offered through the curriculum and through counselling in the school health services which provides young people with knowledge, skills, values, culture and behaviours they need to lead healthy, empowered lives.