As the COVID infection rate in Israel continues to dramatically increase and the Omicron variant spreads throughout the country, a pediatric health expert said on Monday that the Omicron variant disproportionally affects children.
Dr. Meir Ezra Elia, a pediatric health expert, told Radio 103FM on Monday: “According to initial data from the UK, we see that the Omicron ‘favors’ children, especially young ones,” Dr. Elia said. “It’s very troubling.”
Israel’s Health Ministry reported on Sunday that COVID infections among Israeli children have nearly doubled in the past ten days.
A Kan News report on Sunday said that in light of the data from other countries, especially New York and South Africa, the Health Ministry has instructed hospitals to prepare for an increase in pediatric hospitalizations.
New regulations regarding the educational system went into effect on Monday, mandating 7th to 12th graders in red communities where less than 70% of students are vaccinated to study remotely.
Health Ministry officials estimate that based on data from other countries, the number of daily COVID cases in Israel could soon reach tens of thousands per day.
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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7 Responses
Yes omicron favors kids! Especially unvaccinated children! Everyone vaccinate your kids or they all die a slow and painful death (like uncle joe said)
Covid was not interested in kids until the vaccines were mandated for kids. They started up with a slumbering bear, and now this beast is at them full force. That’s the part of science some “brains” don’t seem to absorb.
just trying to scare parents into vaxxing their children
Increased cases among younger population (most < 10, next 10 to 20, next 20 to 30) was already observed in multiple countries. This is probably due to increased transmission rates and decreased period before an infected person transmits to the next. Such increased rates generate exponential chain reaction in every cluster. Not surprising that this happens more among those who meet in large groups and have close contact. Unvaxed kids will be bringing it to unvaxed parents. For those who say it is flu for everyone, age-adjusted ratio of hospitalization for vaxxed and unvaxxed is 15x lower for vaxxed.
This strain is hitting kids right in time for the vaccine for kids rollout. We just had corona again, and this time some of my little kids did have a fever. I thought it was one of those 24 hour viruses, but a few days later I lost my sense of taste.
Point of Note: Although the numbers of infected people in Israel has increased in recent days, the number of Serious to Critical patients has actually gone down. Two days ago it was at 0.8%. Today it is at 0.5%. There are presently, as of today, 15,808 cases of Infected Patients and only 84 patients in Serious to Critical condition. Of those 84 patients it does not state how many are suffering from this new variant of Covid-19 and how many are still suffering from previous variants. The number of death has also gone down daily. As of today only 2 people died as apposed to 7 people two weeks ago. It pays not to put your full trust in the media. Notice how the media mentions how many new cases there are, but doesn’t mention at all how many new patients have been hospitalized. I don’t thing that info has been left out by chance.
It pays to do you own research. Look at the worldmeter website and study the graphs for yourselves. It is a respected official website, not an anti-vaxxer website.
From another website:
The omicron variant that’s taking the world by storm is not “the same disease we were seeing a year ago,” a University of Oxford immunologist said, reinforcing reports about the strain’s milder nature.
The strain first discovered at the end of November appears to be less severe and even patients who do end up in the hospital spend less time there, John Bell, regius professor of medicine at Oxford, said on BBC Radio 4’s Today program.
“The horrific scenes that we saw a year ago — intensive care units being full, lots of people dying prematurely — that is now history in my view, and I think we should be reassured that that’s likely to continue,” Bell said.
Bell’s comments came after the U.K. government said it wouldn’t introduce stricter Covid-19 restrictions in England before the end of the year.
Infections have jumped by more than a quarter of a million in the past week, heaping pressure on Prime Minister Boris Johnson to respond. Health Secretary Sajid Javid late Monday said he’s monitoring the latest data and urged people to be careful, particularly at New Year celebrations.
(c) 2021, Bloomberg · Marthe Fourcade