The children are really the important vectors of transmission of the Covid-19 ? The return to school of the youngest, may raise the epidemic of the coronavirus ? The scientific community seems, on the contrary indicate that children would be less infected and less infectious than adults.
The back-to-school children, planned to start on the 11 may , worried. In question, information that has been widely circulated at the beginning of the outbreak of coronavirus, according to which more young people would be particularly likely to spread the Covid-19. Emmanuel Macron had even assured in his speech of 12 march : “Our children and our youth, according to the scientists, are those who propagate it, it seems, the more quickly the virus,” said the president of the Republic, just before announcing the closure of the crèches and schools.
A study, published April 11 in the journal of the society of infectious disease physicians in the u.s. (Clinical Infectious Diseases) makes, however, a contrary view : the children would not be important vectors of transmission of the disease. The study focuses in particular on a child of 9 years old, having contracted the Covid-19 in one of the first infective foci French, les Contamines-Montjoie (Haute-Savoie). The boy has not transmitted the virus to anyone in the three schools, and the ski club he frequented before the alert is given. He had been in contact with 172 people, including 112 students and teachers during his illness.
“It is possible that the children, because they do not exhibit many of the symptoms and that they have a low viral load, transmit little of this new coronavirus “, explained to AFP Kostas Danis, an epidemiologist with Public Health in France and lead author of this study.
The coronavirus is not the flu
This hypothesis, according to which children would be major vectors of transmission would come to an unfortunate analogy with the flu. “We know that, with regard to epidemics of seasonal influenza, children – and therefore schools – will play a big role in the spread of the virus,” explains the Pr Arnaud Fontanet, head of epidemiology of emerging diseases the Institut Pasteur, in an article in 20 Minutes. “With the coronavirus, the role of children in transmission is not the same. The children will develop mild forms of the Covid-19, we also know now that they are not involved in the infective foci. They usually keep the virus in the throat for about a week. But it has been observed that they are forms “dead ends” of the virus : they are infected by adults – and not the opposite – and little will transmit the virus later. This suggests that children are less likely to be infected and less infectious. “
Author(s): France-Soir