Do children spread COVID-19?
Hamilton study will determine whether vaccinating kids will slow the spread
Critical questions about the role children play in spreading COVID-19 are expected to be answered by a Hamilton study. Dr. Mark Loeb has been awarded nearly $1.5 million from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to take his groundbreaking work that revealed kids are key to the transmission of influenza and replicate it for COVID-19.
“Eventually we’re hopeful there will be vaccines,” said Loeb, chair in infectious diseases at McMaster University. “The question is how do you use the vaccines? What’s the best way to achieve herd immunity? Is there a role for vaccinating children? No one knows this with COVID-19 because there is not a lot known about what role children play in transmission.”
In Hamilton, 49 children and teens have been infected which is about six per cent of the city’s 789 confirmed and probable COVID cases. In Halton, 67 of the 794 cases are in those age 19 or younger which is just over eight per cent.
However, the numbers are likely low because kids weren’t a priority for testing before criteria recently expanded. Many children have milder symptoms and aren’t as high of a risk of becoming severely ill.
Knowing the actual rate of infection and the role kids play in spreading the virus is significant considering Loeb’s past studies have proven that vaccinating children against influenza can protect the entire community — a dramatic finding that has shaped health policy.
“Children were important drivers of influenza epidemics yet traditionally healthy children were not seen as a priority for getting vaccinated,” said Loeb. “We did a study that demonstrated vaccinating children led to a profound herd effect that protected people who were not vaccinated at a level of 60 per cent. It was the same as though they had gotten the flu shot.”
He expects the result will be the same for COVID-19 despite the appearance that children haven’t played a major role in the pandemic so far.
“Children really transmit viruses,” said Loeb. “I don’t think it will be different than other respiratory infections.”
But he adds, “That’s exactly why we’re doing the study to actually look at the role.”
The COVID study will focus on 15 Hutterite colonies in Alberta and five in Saskatchewan with the help of the University of Calgary and the University of Saskatchewan.
“It’s very difficult to do this in large communities like cities and towns of tens or hundreds of thousands of people,” he said. “The Hutterites live in colonies of 90 to 120 people on average ... They’re not totally isolated. They’re in close enough contact with cities and towns that they get outbreaks of respiratory viruses.”
Unlike the influenza studies, there isn’t a vaccine to give the children. Instead the natural immunity provided to those who’ve had the virus will be examined.
“If you have large proportions of children in certain colonies who have been infected, how does that protect the whole community,” he says. “That could give us insight into strategies on vaccination with a COVID vaccine.”
The study will also examine how the virus is spread from children to adults, the role of asymptomatic transmission, how long children are contagious compared to adults and the immunity provided to those infected.
“There are a lot of children in Hutterite colonies so we’ll be able to study this in a lot of detail,” said Loeb.
The researchers will even be able to look at the role of lockdowns and physical distancing in slowing the spread.
“Some colonies are opening up before others,” said Loeb. “There is an ability for us to look at the effects of social distancing to the extent that it is practised in some colonies and not practised in others.”
Lastly, the 12-month study will see how influenza and COVID-19 interact during flu season.
“We’ve been doing this so long that we’ll be able to roll this out very rapidly,” Loeb said about his work with the colonies for more than 15 years now. “We have been doing this for so many years we have a blueprint on how to do it.”