Reports from South Africa that omicron is disproportionately effecting under 5s

[Notsomerryandbright]

I can’t see another thread title discussing this but I’ve just read that Health Officials in South Africa have reported they’ve had a disproportionate number of under 5s admitted into hospital with covid over the last 2 weeks, 29% classified as having severe infection.

I’m not trying to cause panic etc but this really worries me. Just wanted to start a thread in hope someone more knowledgeable will come along and make it seem less scary than the figures suggest.

www.news.com.au/world/africa/south-african-government-medical-adviser-reveals-how-omicron-is-hitting-under5s/news-story/995e5cb71b3e8d7d4ae159f92549b8d0

Might it be because if you're a parent of an under 5, you're advised to go to hospital when with the same symptoms in a child over 5 you'd be advised to try self care? Ie a more cautious approach to under 5s?

I do think though that the more unvaccinated we have the more opportunity for variants to form as the virus will circulate more, and our under 12s do feel like sitting ducks. I think we'll come to regret the way we behaved around failing to protect children sufficiently in the early days.

South Africa, like Brazil, isn’t comparable to the UK in terms of populations. We will need to wait until the variant passes through another western country before being able to compare. It’s possible most adult south african causes of Omicron don’t go through a hospital while people are more likely to spend the money to diagnose and hospitalise kids if they become sick.

@walksen

"100% scaremongering"

You are incorrect here. This is from a briefing the SA health dept who have very clear statistical evidence that compared to the Delta waves there are a higher number of under 5's being admitted. You can watch it on YouTube even.

It may be that they get infected far more easily or the demographics of infections of the omicron wave is different. Maybe the infections are front loaded in the first 2 weeks and when they have more data e.g compare the first month of each wave the numbers will even out - - but they are concerned.

This is different from the alpha Delta stories where you had individual doctors saying they were seeing more kids in their e MN regency department and numbers were maybe higher but only because the wave was bigger/ more kids were infected.

Don't think it is time to worry too much yet but worth keeping an eye on.

South Africa, like Brazil, likes to ignore the systemic health and poverty inequalities in the system at a political level. The government wants the world to believe it’s a ‘developed country’ and as such of course they will say this. The truth is they have neither the appetite nor ability to manage the pandemic in its population. It’s more likely that the infection figures are many times higher than they have assumed they are the child infections are just a proportion of it. Just like in Brazil.

That's what I was initially thinking @Ozanj but it wouldn't explain the proportion of children being admitted because there are fewer adults being admitted in comparison to under 5s. I do agree the cases will be so much higher than reported so hopefully those poor kids admitted are still a tiny fraction of those infected.

The only way that would work is if the adults aren't presenting at hospital and most likely then dying at home. I don't know enough about South Africa to know if that is likely or not. I'd imagine geography, transport and costs could all be obstacles to treatment there.

It is true that South Africa has poverty and inequality (as does the UK, by the way). But it is not as bad as painted in some threads on here.

Apparently affecting pregnant woman too

@Fet2021duejuly2022

Apparently affecting pregnant woman too

All the others do. This shouldn’t be a surprise.

Yes but much more so

@Fet2021duejuly2022

Yes but much more so

What’s the source of this?

Oh well I'm sure we won't have any restrictions coming our way then

I think we’ve seen here that sadly at the moment a large proportion of people in ICU are pregnant unvaccinated women.

I think case numbers are far bigger than reported. And until we have the correct picture we won’t know whether it is disproportionately affecting certain age groups.

I remember the same thing happened in Brazil, due to the high number of cases by consequence you would see more children and babies unfortunately in hospital. Along with other social-economic factors.

I just don’t think we have an accurate picture yet.

@PurpleDaisies

www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/worrying-number-children-pregnant-women-hospital-omicron-surges/

It is not fucking 'scaremongering' to discuss things.

I am tired of people who can't emotionally deal with COVID trying to shut down any discussion.

This is clearly a possible concern. We will know more in time.

I also agree with other posters upthread that the UK government's approach to infections in children has been disgraceful.

"South Africa, like Brazil, likes to ignore the systemic health and poverty inequalities in the system at a political level"

Well I'm not sure those inequalities have changed that significantly since the delta wave they had and the empirical evidence is that under 5 admissions are materially higher.

I think your post is a bit dismissive of the country that raised the alarm and it seems to be their scientists are quite capable of analysing their data for biases etc.

The media will always want click bait headlines. This is the problem. We can see how they can twist many a statistic.

My friend is an ICU doctor and he said months ago how worried he was about the number of unvaccinated pregnant women in ICU here.

Vaccination rates are lower in S.Africa and you would be more likely to seek treatment of pregnant.

There are probably a lot of factors involved.
South Africa population by age: www.statista.com/statistics/1116077/total-population-of-south-africa-by-age-group/

It's a very young population in general. I don't know if anyone can draw any conclusions.

I posted about this last week op when the news broke in the States and was featured in the Washington post and elsewhere. People on here, not all, but a vocal minority were really very upset that I had mentioned it at all - I think it is worrying news.

These were some of the responses
You are faring better on here

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/coronavirus/4414738-Omicron-is-affecting-children-in-South-Africa

@forinborin

It is true that South Africa has poverty and inequality (as does the UK, by the way). But it is not as bad as painted in some threads on here.

Many people in SA have access to world class health care. We need to know more about the people effected and not make negative assumptions. Those who are, for example, malnourished or living with HIV would surely be classed as having an underlying health condition so not put in the 'healthy child' catagory?

The reason people are so anti anything child related it is because it paints a really uncomfortable truth. We are the only country who haven't in anyway shape or form protected our children. For the most part that has been supported by cognitive dissonance of parents.

We are the only country that did completely away with any mitigation in schools (the fact we had minimal mitigation to start, is still relevant). Then we have happily let the virus rip through children, the unvaccinated primary children are the main drivers. We have no idea long term, what damage that may or may not have caused. We have no idea how many children may have lives cut short due to long covid. Schools can't ever fucking close again is too simplistic. Rather than challenge the Government to keep schools open safely (for all). Parents (for the most part) have been happy to follow the party line - kids are safe in schools.

The lack of concern surrounding potential long term implications for the next generation is staggering. Parents positively joyful their children are getting ill, as opposed to actually wishing that their children could access education safely. As it stands, many children are not getting the education the deserve because they are sick or their teachers are and they are with a TA/long term supply.

The outrage isn't there because it is uncomfortable for people to face. I genuinely think this period in history will be judged harshly. For the way we used our own children as a medical experiment to protect ourselves and preserve our quality of life.

@rrhuth

It is not fucking 'scaremongering' to discuss things.

I am tired of people who can't emotionally deal with COVID trying to shut down any discussion.

This is clearly a possible concern. We will know more in time.

I also agree with other posters upthread that the UK government's approach to infections in children has been disgraceful.

I think you are right, a lot of people cant emotionally deal with truth. We saw it in February and early March 2020 when anyone talking about what was coming was accused of scaremongering and attacked. The first thread I saw on MN about covid 19 ended up being taken down for scaremongering by MN. It actually just had the facts coming out of China posted.

It is actually okay to say “we don’t know, we need to wait and find out, let’s not panic people in the meantime”. It’s not living in denial or refusing to face the ‘uncomfortable truth’.

There are other explanations for increased child hospitalisations in one part of SA, other than omicron being worse in children. See eg MyFieldOfFucksIsBarren ‘s post upthread: “ There is also uncertainty on whether these infants had COVID-19 at all, as all infants with respiratory symptoms are being treated as if they had COVID-19—meaning they could just have the flu, of which Twashne is experiencing an increased caseload.” We don’t know yet. We just don’t.

Just like there are rumours that omicron is milder. That would be good. But we don’t know if that’s true, we can’t make decisions on the basis of “I heard it reported” and “this supports other things I think” so let’s assume it is”, we need to wait until there’s actual evidence.