Doctors concerned as number of children sick with COVID-19 rises in Kansas City
By Kelly Eckerman
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KANSAS CITY, Mo (KMBC) — The number of children sick with COVID-19 is rising in the Kansas City metro. Children’s Mercy Hospital is at its peak, with the number of COVID-19 patients hospitalized there nearly doubling in the past week.
With children now heading back to school, doctors said they are concerned.
Many children are heading back to class in the next few weeks. It is the second time to start the school year during a pandemic. But doctors said it’s different this year because mutations of the virus are more contagious.
“And when you have a higher proportion of people getting infected, a higher, you know amount, then you’re going to see more severe disease. You’re going to see hospitalizations. You’re going to see kids, you know, needing ventilator support,” said Dr. Angela Myers, who leads the infectious diseases division at Children’s Mercy Hospital.
Myers said she is concerned about the surging numbers, with a peak of 300 positive cases last week.
Last Thursday, 12 children there were hospitalized with COVID-19. The next day it rose to 19 children. Now, there are 22. Seven are in the intensive care unit, ranging in age from infants to teens.
Myers said she believes it is best for students to be in school. For it to work, she said it means mitigation procedures, such as masking for all ages.
“That’s the way you’re going to stay the safest. That’s the way be able to stay in your after-school activities and your sports, is where you’re going to prevent getting infected, is to stay masked. You know, those are big motivating factors for teenagers, right? They want to stay a part of all of those things,” Myers said.
Myers said she hopes people take the virus seriously as it is having a bigger impact on children now.
“The data has changed over time and this virus has changed over time, and so we really need to focus on what’s happening now, not what was happening a year ago,” she said.
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