The American Association of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association has published a detailed report saying that more than 338,000 children in 49 states have contracted COVID-19. The study included data from 49 states, New York City, Washington, Puerto Rico and Guam. Hawaii was included as a reporting state.
The study says that keiki represented 8.8% of all cases reported by July 30, using a cumulative case count at the time of 3,835,573 (today the country’s case count is more than 5 million).
Cases in keiki increased 40% between July 16 and July 30, with more than 97,000 children in the U.S. diagnosed during that two week period. Health experts have noted that during state and local “stay at home” orders, children were home and not generally exposed to others at schools or playgrounds, but once those “stay at home” orders loosened, there was more opportunity for keiki to be around non-family members.
In 20 states plus New York City, children were 0.6%-3.7% of total reported hospitalizations, and between 0.6%-8.9% of all child COVID-19 cases resulted in hospitalization.
With 44 states plus New York City reporting, children were 0%-0.8% of all COVID-19 deaths, and 20 states reported zero child deaths.
The study notes that the data is only known for children who were actually tested, not those who may have been infected but never confirmed as having COVID-19.
The Hawaii data was taken from the State’s COVID-19 Dashboard. It is reporting that so far, 447 keiki in the state –19 years or younger–are confirmed as having COVID-19.