It is the idea that young people are less sensitive to COVID-19 than adults, especially the elderly. But they are far from immune to crisis.
Beyond the uncertainties about the direct effects of COVID-19 on fitness, young people are highly vulnerable to the economic consequences of the pandemic, which threatens to push 71 to 100 million people into excessive poverty around the world.
The dangers are acute in the United States, which not only has the highest number of COVID-19 deaths in the world and sets new infection records on an unmarried day, but also has the highest rate of child poverty among wealthy democracies.
Young blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans have higher poverty rates than their white counterparts.
With unemployment and declining government support, the scenario is expected to worsen further, with serious long-term consequences.
There is a wealth of conclusive evidence that poverty is very negative for cognitive development, emotional stability and physical condition of children, due to points such as food insecurity, lack of quality physical care, lower network resources and stressful home environments.
The most recent neuroscience studies suggest that poverty alone can also expand and function the brain.
All of this results in fewer years of completed studies, decreased lifetime income and a greater chance of ending up in a criminal or teen parent.
The COVID-19 crisis is aggravating poverty in all its dimensions. For starters, the lack of confidence in food more than tripled among families with young children in the United States (9.3% to 29.5%) from February to mid-May, even when enrollment in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program increased by nearly 20%.
Like poverty, lack of confidence in food disproportionately affects non-white households. Recent knowledge shows that more than 36% of black families and 45% of Hispanic families reduced their spending on food during the pandemic, compared to about 24% of white families.
Closing schools has only made things worse. Prior to the pandemic, 22 million young Americans relied on loose or subsidized school meals, funded through the National School Lunch Program. School closures have also disrupted young people’s access to valuable newspapers and recommendations from teachers, counselors and nurses.
Many do not have supervised recreation time at home. And while e-learning has helped mitigate educational losses, it has in fact not compensated for them, especially for the poor, who lack their own computers or reliable Internet access.
As a result, the school gap between highs and least disadvantaged is widening in the United States. And the effects have been documented all over the world.
At the same time, the combination of lower income and increased stress in fitness systems has led many young people to lose preventive care and other non-emergency care regimens. In some U.S. states, some of the youth do not get the immunization regimen during the COVID-19 crisis.
Finally, tensions are rising, especially among low-wage staff who have recently been unemployed. This staff, especially the one with young people, reports high degrees of depressive symptoms, whether or not they get unemployment benefits. This can be very negative for the physical and emotional well-being and progression of young people.
In the United States, all this happened despite the CareS (Aid, Relief, and Economic Security act for Coronavirus), which provided for one-off bills for maximum households, as well as a $600-a-week accrual on unemployment benefits. .
When those provisions expire – unemployment insurance extended at the end of this month and other provisions at the end of the year – child poverty can reach 30-50%, or about five million children.
This result can be avoided. In many European countries, governments have presented wage promises for workers, thus avoiding spikes in unemployment and poverty.
Even before the pandemic, these countries, as well as Canada, had more beneficial social policies focused on children. With social spending for young people about twice what it is in the United States (as a percentage of GDP), it is unexpected that child poverty rates are much lower: about 11% in France, 7% in Germany, and 13% in Canada.
One of the reasons why the United States does not offer something similar is, in part, a state of mind: many Americans do not perceive the myriad of complex dynamics that contribute to poverty and instead accuse the poor of their own situation. According to this logic, it is up to parents, not governments, to ensure that their children’s wishes are fulfilled.
However, the United States has systems that have minimized poverty among the elderly. Now it’s time to put it in a similar position for the kids.
U.S. leaders can simply receive unconditional monthly monetary bills (or money-like benefits) for families with children, similar to those in many other countries.
According to a study to be published at Columbia University, Canada’s economic benefits program provides about $4,000 a year, and bills are gradually reduced as the family circle’s source of income increases. A similar policy in the United States would reduce child poverty by more than half. For black children, the relief would be even greater.
When young people grow up in poverty, everyone suffers. In fact, child poverty puts a price on the United States at more than $1 trillion a year due to lost productivity and higher prices for physical care, crime, and child homelessness.
If the ethical imperative to protect our youth is not convincing enough for American leaders, the economic imperative will be sufficient to drive action.
Lisa A. Gennetian is a professor at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy. Jeff Madrick is Invisible Americans’ recent highest, The Trgic Cost of Child Poverty
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