I joined fellow pediatricians in a Virtual Town Hall meeting this week. At that time there was only one child under 17 admitted to CHOC with COVID19. They did say they were treating half a dozen or more 17/18 year olds. We now believe most children will not be hit hard by this disease.
THERE WAS CONJECTURE that perhaps the recurrent pediatric coronaviral infections impart some immunity. In my office we see coronavirus often on respiratory swabs. Good news for parents who caught it from their snot nosed kids!
But don't be too complacent:
Consider the recent mortality rate of flu which is ~0.1% of people who contracted it. This season ~62K people in the US died from Influenza.
For Coronavirus the mortality rate is much larger at
1.38%. Also note that transmission rates are higher. So we are expecting a terrible overload to the healthcare system.
News for ADULTS: obesity is the biggest risk for a poor outcome (with secondary hypertension, DM, CHF etc). The immune response is different in obese people which causes the high morbidity rate. In addition, for all patients, treatments such as
hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin have far greater toxicity than good when used prophylactically.