The wave of RSV, flu and other infections filled more than three-quarters of children’s hospital beds.
When her son was born seven weeks earlier, weighing just 2. 5 pounds, RH watched the boy stay in the neonatal intensive care unit for 37 days.
When they nevertheless left the hospital, RH, who asked to use his initials for privacy reasons, breathed a sigh of relief. The baby, despite his difficult beginnings, was in very good health. But just a few months later, the child lands in the hospital with a harmful virus, RSV.
“It’s terrifying,” he said. Her grandson was hooked up to a maze of wires and sound monitors, adding oxygen to help him breathe and intravenous fluids for dehydration. He stayed there for a week.
Hospitalizations for respiratory viruses like RSV, flu, and others are emerging in the U. S. In the U. S. , with children under five, especially newborns and premature toddlers, at maximum risk, while simultaneous shortages of antivirals and antibiotics have spread across the country.
Newborn hospitalization rates for RSV are seven times higher than in 2018, the last full season before the pandemic, and flu hospitalizations are the worst in a decade. Rhinoviruses, enteroviruses, adenoviruses, metapneumoviruses, and parainfluenza are also contributing to this wave of disease, and Covid cases are beginning to recede in the United States.
More than three-quarters of paediatric hospital beds were already occupied by mid-November. An Oregon hospital instituted pediatric crisis care standards, an emergency measure to expand existing capacity. They swell in pediatric patients. Children’s hospitals in Boston and Salt Lake City have canceled scheduled surgeries.
At least 3 young people have died from RSV and 12 young people have died from the flu this year, according to the U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). U. S.
Major children’s fitness organizations are calling on Biden’s management to declare a national emergency, as some 55 million Americans return from Thanksgiving holiday trips and many prepare for Christmas and New Year’s celebrations.
“I think it’s been a month since this was called a national emergency,” said Anita K Patel, a pediatric critical care specialist at National Children’s Hospital in Washington, D. C. , and an assistant professor of pediatrics at the George Washington School of Medicine and Health Sciences. .
Children’s National has been operating at or near full capacity for more than two months amid a “huge increase” in RSV and flu cases, as well as other viruses, he said.
“It’s like a viral petri dish right now,” said Mark Kline, chief medical officer and medical director of New Orleans Children’s Hospital. He has noticed a “deluge” of children requiring hospitalization for viral respiratory problems in the next four to six weeks. .
The curves of new cases and hospitalizations are “almost vertical,” Kline said. “You’re at winter highs in the early part of November. “Its hospital formula is doubling the number of patients seen at this time of year. , and flu positivity rates, for example, have been “extremely high” at 30 to 35 percent.
Respiratory viruses such as influenza and RSV accumulate regularly in winter, but not so early, not simultaneously, and not on this scale. “What’s unique this year is the volume of cases,” Patel said.
Another challenge is the number of other viruses circulating at the same time. “Any of them separately would have forced the system, but we’re dealing with at least 4 simultaneously,” Kline said. Pediatricians and number one care practices are also overwhelmed.
The crisis of children’s fitness has impacted American society. Some schools closed or temporarily switched to virtual learning because staff and students became ill. And the resurgence of illnesses, even mild ones, wreaked havoc on parents. In October, more than 100,000 paintings due to childcare issues, more than any other point in recent years, adding 2020.
RH’s son contracted Covid in August, and his pediatrician warned that he could get sicker than himself in the coming weeks as he recovered. A friend also warned her that RSV affects newborns and premature babies. When the baby snorted a few weeks later, RH and his wife kept a close eye on it. After a few days, he seemed to be getting sicker, more lethargic. He then vomited and his breathing was labored.
“It’s just that you feel like where you are, everything is wrong,” HR said.
His considerations were confirmed. After a few hours of waiting in the emergency room, the medical team agreed that it seemed that the bathroom had a severe case of RSV and needed to be admitted for care. However, this hospital was full of pediatric patients. They had to be taken by ambulance to another hospital about forty-five minutes from their home.
“It turned out to be the last bed they had,” RH said. He felt lucky to have listened to his instincts and waited.
The reasons for this wave of diseases are complex and are still being understood.
One term, “immunity debt,” emerged during the pandemic, though it’s not a clinical or medical term, and definitions can be opposed.
Some have proposed that Covid precautions would lead to a weakening of children’s immune formulas, similar to the hygiene hypothesis, the discredited concept that being in poor health is smart to build the immune formula. The concept that taking precautions weakens the immune formula is a “totally unwanted assumption,” Patel said.
Another interpretation is that covid itself has weakened the immune system, making other infections more severe. But there is no indication of permanent damage to the immune system, as can be the case with viruses such as HIV. “I haven’t noticed any evidence of that,” Kline said.
Several viral infections, including measles, are capable of temporarily suppressing immune responses, and more studies on potential headaches after covid is needed, Mavens said. Some immune dysfunctions could persist for months after mild or moderate covid infections, according to a study. Another recent study found that young children seemed to have worse episodes of RSV shortly after a covid infection.
“We see that covid affects the formula of each and every organ in your body,” Patel said. “Most young people at this level have had covid, which unfortunately could also weaken their immune formula. But it’s too early to tell. “
It is also conceivable that a more serious variant of RSV is circulating in some communities.
But it may just be the large number of infections that cause the strain.
The pediatric outbreak has been compared to the Covid crisis of March 2020 that threatened to paralyze hospitals. And this is becoming the most sensitive part of an existing health crisis, with years of health shortages, ailments and burnout.
However, some of those harmful viruses can be prevented by vaccination, and all can be mitigated with measures such as air quality and the use of masks.
The International Epidemiological Association last week called for global vaccination of young people against covid-19 amid incredibly low vaccination rates for young people. The flu vaccine has also been underused.
While there is no vaccine against RSV, there are monoclonal antibodies that are incredibly effective in preventing hospitalization for RSV in at-risk infants, adding to premature young children; However, many parents still don’t know this and getting approval from insurance companies can take time.
The young people most vulnerable to the worst outcomes are also too young to get vaccinated against flu and covid, and they are too young to wear masks.
This means that other precautions will also have to be taken through everyone around you.
Masks, for example, have been shown to be effective in saving you from respiratory viruses. “Masks will prevent you from transmitting those other respiratory viruses in the same way masks will prevent you from transmitting covid-19,” Kline said.
Schools and daycare centers also invest in increased ventilation and air filtration to remove many airborne pathogens, adding respiratory viruses and allergens, he said.
And staying home when you have health problems is one of the most effective tactics for reducing transmission. Even illnesses that seem mild in older children and adults can be devastating to young children.
“If your child is sick, don’t send him to school, don’t take him to family circle meetings,” Kline said. “Keep it at home. “
After a week in the hospital, RH’s son had taken a significant step forward, still having a persistent cough a few weeks later. He was already vaccinated against the flu and then they are vaccinating him against Covid.
RH is now in a project to let other parents know how harmful those viruses can be to children. He took a fact sheet on bronchial diseases that had been given to him by a doctor and “just distributed it to everyone he knew who has a child the age of two or who is pregnant,” she said. “I had to say, ‘Read this. ‘”
HR urges families to be careful this holiday season, restrict gatherings, take precautions and travel.
Even when you can access care, watching your child battle the disease in a hospital bed is stressful, HR said. “Any hospital stay will be quite traumatic, mentally, physically and financially. vacation decisions.