Children often remain symptom-free - but they can get the virus and spread it just as much as adults.
New studies suggest that the virus is particularly rampant in schools.
The number of
corona cases *
in Germany is at a new high.
Science demands tougher measures * - schools should also be closed *.
New studies show that children spread the virus at least as quickly as adults.
Munich - The
Corona *
numbers are higher than ever - and it is still not clear where the virus is spreading fastest.
What are the "drivers" of the pandemic?
The
Leopoldina Science Academy advises politicians to close schools
.
And rightly so: unlike in spring, there are many indications that children and young people are contributing to the spread of Corona to an extent that was previously not suspected.
An as yet unpublished
mass test from Austria,
for example, shows that schoolchildren are infected just as often as teachers.
Study director Michael Wagner, microbiology professor at the University of Vienna, told the “Spiegel”: “Schools are not an island of the blessed.
If you don't close it, you run a
considerable risk
. "
It is easy to underestimate children when the virus spreads: They have
fewer symptoms
and are tested less often.
Although they are theoretically harder to infect, they compensate for this through their behavior and their
many close social contacts
.
This is the conclusion of a British study: "With a decreasing number (infected, ed.) In all age groups, the positive rates for children in secondary schools are still the highest."
+
A boy is being tested for corona.
Children are often symptom-free, but studies have shown that they are just as susceptible to the virus as adults.
© dpa Picture Alliance / ZUMA Press
The Drosten study showed that infants are infected just like adults
So symptom-free super spreaders?
With the flu, children are usually responsible for a large spread of the disease.
Wagner believes that children are "clearly under-tested".
The study of three Austrian universities tested
15,000 children and 1,200 teachers in 240 schools
, mostly with a neck-friendly gurgling test.
Among those tested, 0.4 percent were infected without knowing it.
As a study in Bavaria by the Helmholtz Center in Munich with 11,000 test persons, the Wagner study shows: The number of
unreported cases
among students and teachers is similarly high.
The results make it clear that children are just as affected by Covid-19 as adults - including small children.
The Berlin virologist
Christian Drosten
already
proved this
with a study in spring.
According to a study from Chicago, the results are even more dramatic: Ironically, the youngest (up to five years) had
ten to a hundred times more viruses in their throats
than older test persons.
The new ONS data.
This week, too, the proof rates in the school years above primary school exceeded those in all other sections of the population.
Mind you: no retirement homes included, 70+ figures come from households like all the others.
pic.twitter.com/q2L5G1v4LG
- Christian Drosten (@c_drosten) December 11, 2020
A study in Salt Lake County suggests that symptom-free children also infect others: Twelve infected children there had infected at least a quarter of their contacts outside of daycare.
A case follow-up by the team led by the doctor Magdalena Okarska-Napierała from the University Hospital in Warsaw found that
eight crèche children had transmitted the virus to three siblings, eight mums and dads and one grandparent
.
Studies from 101 households in Nashville, Tennessee, and Marshfield, Wisconsin also found that the children had brought the virus into many families.
Children as corona super spreaders?
"Of course it is the case that the events are carried into the schools"
Such a picture emerges in Canada as well: the President of the Association of Microbiologists and Infectious Diseases in Québec said after the number of cases soared after the school restart
: "The schools were instrumental in triggering the second wave in Québec."
And the
Robert Koch Institute
leaves no doubt either: “Of course, the events are carried into schools,” says RKI boss Lothar Wieler.
"And is also carried out of the schools."
So it is hard to imagine that a school lockdown is currently not an appropriate measure - even if the
school development of the children
and the enormous
burden on the parents
must be taken into account.
But caution also applies to the protection of children: According to a meta-study, corona long-term effects also affect them.
-
* Merkur.de is part of the Ippen network.
List of rubric lists: © dpa Picture Alliance / ZUMA Press