Hepatitis outbreak in children

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I'm currently really quite unwell with Covid and not sleeping very well so please be gentle, but is anyone else really worried about the reports of this hepatitis outbreak in children now being monitored by the WHO? It seems to have gained traction over the last few days and lots of reports coming out about it now. I know very little about hepatitis but I know its quite rare to see such severe cases in children. Could Covid be the cause? I'm just feeling really quite worried about it and so sad for these poor children and their families, how horrendous after we've all just come through a pandemic .

the newspapers are quoting them directly. Where else do you expect to find the quotes? Their personal Twitter accounts?

I highly doubt there's any consensus amongst the medical community that lockdown is responsible. It really does seem like they believe it is most likely related to Adenovirus or a coinfection with Covid right now. You have to ask yourself who does, and doesn't benefit from claiming it has nothing to do with rampant Covid infection in children in this country (where most of these cases have been found). I find it interesting a large cluster has also occurred in Alabama, which is a very anti mask, very anti covid mitigation State.

Covid wasn’t only found in something like 17% of the cases. So who benefits from pushing the view that covid is the cause..? People who love lockdowns maybe..?

The adenovirus was found in many more cases than covid, the theory is that lockdown lowered kids immune systems to allow it to cause the hepatitis. Not ‘just lockdown’

According to one report, almost all cases they have found in Israel identified Covid infection in the prior three and a half months to coming down with this new Hepatitis. There just isn't the data yet for anyone to be making any definitive statements one way or another at the moment, certainly not enough for people to declare lockdown was the cause, but I suspect they have their own reasons for doing so, particularly those who were in charge of making these important public health decisions

But you’re doing the same thing - making an assumption without the facts, and one that suits you. If you say there’s no reason to believe lockdown was the cause so you don’t, then the same goes for covid - there’s no hard evidence of that either.

Byvickysmith on Instagram has posted pics and links to the UK Health Security Agency technical briefing on this, and provided a handy summary

The problem is many children have been exposed to Covid by now so you will have the cause/correlation issue.

Newspapers and news sites such as the BBC and The Telegraph that myself and others have quoted would get in to a lot of trouble if they were mis-quoting experts and scientists..

Like I said I think I’ll listen to them and their hypotheses over random Mumsnetters. They are specialists in their fields.

Maybe it’s hard to accept the cure was worse than the disease after all. Especially for young children.

@DaisyQuakeJohnson I’ve quoted 2 medical experts as have others. How many would you like?

I’d hardly call quoting scientists derailing the thread.

The OP was worried Covid was causing these infections. Pointing out what experts are saying (rather than Mumsnetters) is not derailing the thread just because it’s the opposite of what you believe.

Looks to me like there is quite a bit of consensus in the medical and scientific community on this one.

Adenovirus was found in many many more of these cases than covid; and so is the lead theory. It doesn’t normally cause hepatitis in these numbers so the question is why? What has happened recently to change this? The biggest change in circumstances in terms of immune systems in small children is lockdown. It makes eminent sense to me.

I wonder if there are any studies taking place that I could contact? I suspect the numbers are much higher than reports.

Ds1 (4yo) came down with a nasty bug in February. All symptoms were identical to when he had covid in 2021 however daily testing was negative. Ds2 (8m) then caught the same bug and again daily covid tests were negative.

After a few weeks I noticed that Ds1 had a mild yellow tinge about his skin. He was also complaining of stomach pains and sore knees. After a few weeks the yellow skin had faded however he is still sometimes complaining of stomach cramps, seems well enough in himself so I don't think he needs seen by a GP.

Ds2 did not develop the yellow skin and as far as I'm aware, has not had the stomach pains.

I've only recently read there was a cluster of hepatitis in children local to me so I believe it's likely Ds1 had a mild case of it.

To add, Ds1 has attended nursery from 9 months and was attending nursery throughout all lockdowns so was still exposed to normal childhood illnesses. He also had covid late 2021 however Ds2 has yet to catch it (as far as I'm aware)

I'm following this topic closely with interest.

Yep adenovirus was found in 75% of cases versus 16% Covid (which the report said was to be expected given the high levels of Covid circulating.

What has happened recently to change this? The biggest change in circumstances in terms of immune systems in small children is lockdown.

I would say the biggest change in circumstances was a widely circulating new virus, Covid-19, which has been shown to have multi-organ effects.

@milkyaqua Did you actually read the links @NotMrsTumble posted from the recent technical briefing? Helpfully the experts (not Mumsnetters) have listed the theories from best to worst fit according to the data they have (actual evidence!) and susceptibility due to
lockdown and other social distancing measures is listed ABOVE prior Covid infection.

So all the experts in this field who were at this meeting do not agree with you. But as you were....

No, I did not read the unreadable links. I would have liked to, but I was unable to.

I have read the Who's succinct report on what is known so far.

WHO

Maybe settle down, and please stop @-ing me.

Ah I see @milkyaqua that explains it.

You can click and then make them larger to read the small text. But the experts from the meeting all helpfully listed the hypothesis in order of best to worst fit. I guess they had to have some consensus to do this.

Yes they’re all theories at this point but it’s a very worrying situation and I’ll be taking my information from these scientists and not those on Mumsnet that think they know better.

Sorry. New mumsnet meant the pics were pretty much unreadable. If you have Instagram then the info from byvickysmith is fairly easy to find.
I actually don't think lockdown per se has caused this, especially given the ages of the youngest cases.
But the long and short of it is "nobody knows, we're noticed a worrying uptick and we're working on several possible theories". Human nature to want an instant answer, unfortunately that's often not how science works.
Here's a link to a digest of the WHO report by an epidemiologist. Your Local Epidemiologist

Your son had a yellow tinge and stomach pains and you didn’t make a GP appointment??

Another point of view
here

Oh not her! She would have had us in permanent lockdown for years.

Yikes, thanks for that @SpidersareTapdancing. I’ve been itching like crazy lately and when I had Covid in March I had the Covid rashes/hives on my hands too. Great. This is another thing to ponder. Hopefully it’s just my detergent 🤞😬

No, tummy issues are not uncommon after a virus/bug and I'm not a medical professional so by the time I realised these were something I should worry about. The yellow skin had failed and Ds was feeling well in himself again.

I think it could be covid related. This virus has not acted in a way we have been able to correlate to other previous virus. Initially we thought it was primarily a respiratory virus (hence the ventilator rush) but we have subsequently discovered all sorts of additional issues- blood clots, long term heart and neurological issues. I presume that it could impact the liver too and given the exceptionally high levels of Omicron circulating from December onwards - theoretically it would not be surprising that there is a link emerging now.
I appreciate the adenovirus theory too - though quite a few affected are either too young or too old for the theory of lockdown impacting initial immunity to hold in all cases.
This news leaves a nasty taste in the mouth - rather like - what is around the corner now?

She didn’t mention any lockdown there though.

plus I don’t associate her with lockdowns but with vaccinating children and still having mitigation in place (aka. clean air!). Can’t see an issue with that!

@JingsMahBucket you might want to double check with your GP.
Liver issues aren’t unusual with covid unfortunately.