This is concerning

[owlstwooting]

Significant alert in respect of Children and Paediatric shock. It has been reported that over the past three weeks, there has been a rise in the number of Children presenting with a multisystem inflammatory state requiring intensive care.

Looks legit, sadly

mobile.twitter.com/ThePalpitations/status/1254529121134264322

There is no need for a campaign! It was irresponsible of PICS to tweet this out of context. In their own words it's a 'small number' of children 'possibly' related to covid 19.

Their own website says you don't need to do anything more as a parent than you would normally for a very sick child:

"If you are a parent please be assured that serious illness as a result of COVID 19 still appears to be a very rare event in children. If your child is unwell or has the symptoms of sepsis then please seek medical attention in the usual way as set out in guidance from the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health"

No I think we need a message that we should be taking our children to hospital and/or get medical treatment based on the report bumblingbovine set out

Not based on this.

@Quartz2208 apologies I'd missed that tangent. I do agree with you.

Quartz yy I agree. There have been conflicting medical articles and advice released regarding DCs and symptoms.
It's also not an usual time so DCs may be stressed / anxious, etc and that can manifest as stomach pains and upsets.There have been a few posts/threads on here about DCs having stomach aches so clear guidelines on when parents should contact GP or 111 would definitely be beneficial.

NHS England have said fewer than 20 cases. When the population aged 0-19 is over 15 million.

I was concerned at the beginning that parents of young children were diagnosing their kids with Covid.
I noticed this on our school mums’ WhatsApp group. “So and so” has “got it”. I said “bear in mind it could be any childhood infection” and wasn’t popular as I think they were getting attention from their kid “having it” as opposed to having a boring old bacterial infection. It’s dangerous to forget about other ailments. Things will be missed.

I think they are a lot more worried about other ailments in children than Covid as has been said people are too scared to take children to hospital early. This could well be from other infections.

I am more interested in the timing. As we are getting a bit of lockdown fatigue. Quite interesting that something to scare us is in the news again.

They have just been talking about this at the press conference. They have said that it is very rare but they are very worried about it, they are still looking at whether it is definitely covid linked but Chris Whitty says it is very likely that it is.

Ps they also did emphasise that important thing is to seek medical help when concerned about a sick child

Stephen Powis referred to it in the briefing as a reason why they need to proceed with caution regarding reopening schools.

Chris Whitby sorry.

Whitty even!!

17:59

Health sec 'very worried' about reports of serious coronavirus-related syndrome in children
Mr Hancock says he is "very worried" about reports of a serious coronavirus-related syndrome developing in a small number of children and is "looking into it closely".
Prof Powis says it is "only in the last few days" that the reports of this have been seen.
It is being looked at "as a matter of urgency", he adds.
"It's really too early to say if there is a link (to coronavirus)", Prof Powis says.
Prof Whitty says it is "very rare situation" but admits it is "entirely plausible" it is caused by coronavirus.

Thanks for the sane discussion and interesting links @DuLANGDuLANGDuLANG. I hope your daughter stays well.

@EdgarAllenCrow

NHS England have said fewer than 20 cases. When the population aged 0-19 is over 15 million

The total confirmed cases of coronavirus in the 0-19 the group isn't very high though, it's over 1000 cases as of yesterday. So 20 odd cases within that is a much higher risk. Hopefully either very few Children catch it or there are a lot of very mild untested cases in Children to counteract this, but we just don't know at this point. This is why we need more testing and more research.

Its probably far likely to be the latter that there are lots of mild untested cases.

DD Im pretty sure had it (GP heard her cough over the phone). She was ill with it like when she had flu and had a week off school. I was ill for a week but DS was fine

It is on the BBC news

But OP, we don't know this is anything to do with COVID since some children did not test positive for COVID or antibodies suggesting they have had it already.

This is my point. Medics share this info all the time and it usually is nothing of any significance. They're not normally made public. This has been and shouldn't have been IMO precisely because of the reaction it has provoked.

But OP, we don't know this is anything to do with COVID since some children did not test positive for COVID or antibodies suggesting they have had it already.

But they did have serological evidence of possible preceeding Sars it says in the letter.
So the antibody thing isn't necessarily true.

From my understanding after speaking to an ICU doc these children are very very ill (so anyone worried about their child just complaining of a tummy ache need not)
Also they think it might be related to that the children are not being brought into hospital earlier. Parents trying to persevere at home.
This is basically a reminder that doctors need to keep seeing their patients if needed and for parents to make sure they seek help if their children are not getting better or if they are concerned.

@EdgarAllenCrow do you not think that what you are saying is in danger of infantilizing parents? The vast majority of parents can understand that there is a risk and symptoms and statistics without panicking.

Up until now we thought it was highly unlikely that our dc would get the virus and if they did they would be likely mild symptoms. This is no longer the case, and the symptoms presenting in children are different from those in adults. This is really important information for parents to know, as well as the fact that currently it is rare.

Also if awareness means that there are fewer playdates being organised for a while and fewer people saying "oh we all need to get it to get immunity we don't agree with lockdown" that that would be a positive thing I think.

Up until now we thought it was highly unlikely that our dc would get the virus and if they did they would be likely mild symptoms. This is no longer the case

@iseeu I completely agree with you that parents should be able to access the information, and know as much as possible about different presentations in children. I don't know if it is correct that people have thought children were unlikely to get it though, I might be wrong but I thought the jury was still out on how many catch it with few or no symptoms. As for it being likely to be mild, I think that data on that hasn't changed much if this extreme inflammatory reaction is very rare.

However, people on here have been very definite about 'knowing' their risk is low or that their child's risk is low, when actually no one knows the long term effects of even asymptomatic infection. Possible neurological involvement is really weighing on my mind, but that's a separate issue.

I dont think it means that at all Iseeu I think it means for some children they have a bad reaction

DS had all those symptoms from a bad reaction to Scarlet Fever. So it could be that people are trying too much at home and letting it get to that state

@Inkpaperstars you are right about what i said about "highly unlikely that our dc would get the virus" - i thought that after posting! - but i think our assumption of mildness needs to shift now even if we are talking about very small numbers. I agree about people "knowing". What do you mean about "neurological involvement"? What weighs on my mind is what we don't yet know about it coming and going in the same patients...but again a separate issue.

No @Iseeu

"We thought it was unlikely that our children would get the virus and if they did; they would likely have mild symptoms. This is no longer the case".

It is still entirely the case. Every medical advisor will tell you the same and they are. Very clearly.

PICS are now making it clear (because they're embarassed) that their statement was meant for medics and paeds who are assessing children to look out for unusual symptoms and it should have not been used to panic the public.

A very, very small number of healthy adults, pregnant women and children will have a rare but acute reaction to viral infections. They do with flu and similar every single year and in greater numbers than what we're seeing here. But the medics know about it as it's not new to them.

But the public don't know it, look at the posters on these threads who had rare post-viral reactions in the past or experienced it in their children. It's not publicised because it's so rare and not news.

COVID is new and a pandemic. A global NEWS item and medics and the public are on high alert for anything new. Which may be totally unrelated and this could be the case here or it could be a post-COVID thing which effects children no more than reactions post-flu or even in fewer numbers than any other post-viral infection.