‘NO EVIDENCE VIRUS WILL TARGET KIDS IN 3RD WAVE’

NEW DELHI: There is no evidence that children will be severely or more affected in the third wave of Covid-19, the director of the country’s premier medical institution said on Monday.

“Even if children get infected, the disease is usually mild... So far, there is no data to show children are getting more affected,” said Dr Randeep Guleria, director, AIIMS.

NEW DELHI: There is no evidence yet to assume that the next wave of infections will hit children harder, the government’s top experts said on Monday, citing data that suggests the impact of Covid-19 on different age groups was similar in the second wave of cases to what it was in the first, last year.

The clarifications come at a time when several officials, and some experts, have said that children may be at higher risk in the future. Most experts, however, say that this could be because children are not yet eligible for vaccines and getting doses to them could take longer.

“If we look at the data, and compare both the Covid-19 waves, children are usually protected as the numbers are fewer. Even if they get infection, the disease is usually mild. The virus is the same; it has not changed, and there is no indication that in the third Covid-19 children will be more impacted,” said Dr Randeep Guleria, director, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).

“Another hypothesis is that the virus enters the body with the ace receptor, and in children you find less of such receptors as compared to adults. This is one hypothesis why the disease is less in children. So far, there is no data to show children are getting more affected, so in future too we cannot say for sure if children will be impacted more,” he added.

Guleria also said that in AIIMS, a routine death audit was being done in people who succumbed to Covid-19 and comparing the data from the past one-and-a-half months to the previous Covid-19 wave showed age-group and comorbidity parameters were almost similar. Older people, and people with more than one comorbidities, were most affected.

“We try to present the bigger picture in front of people. In the past it has been clarified that in both the waves, the level of infection in different age groups has remained the same. Overall, infection pattern in both waves is the same,” said Lav Agarwal, joint secretary, health ministry.