Kids might not be able to transmit much because they have smaller lungs, speak softer and are shorter. But as @JumoDr said, they'd shed what's in their nose & throat, not lungs. If height is an issue, they would transmit to other kids. and speak softer--have you met my kids? 4/x
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I know people will say, well, of course symptomatic kids have more virus. The study tried to control for that as well as they could. But also, hi, asymptomatic transmission is a thing in adults, so why not in kids? 5/x
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Because we have epidemiology data for adults. These are *symptomatic*’kids whose rarity is an unsolved puzzle and whose epidemiological data is going the other way from adults. That’s the difference.
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Replying to @zeynep @apoorva_nyc and
(Also there’s other data on kids under five being more vulnerable. For some reason it is 5 to ~14 with the different pattern and ticking up from there. I always wondered why day cares are open if the elementary schools are not.)
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It includes kids above 5, too. And the symptoms are mild, so I’m not so sure they are as rare as you are suggesting.
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Yes I was pointing to kids under five having potentially higher loads. Symptomatic kids (5-~14) are disproportionately rare in almost all studies in all countries. Ticks up but still relatively fewer after that too. Seems pretty undisputed, no? Part of the puzzle.
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Maybe, maybe not? There are huge numbers of asymptomatic adults, too. Could be as simple as who has somewhat recently been exposed to a common cold coronavirus. I’m just not sure the epidemiology on asymptomatic adults is any different than kids—we don’t know enough about either
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I disagree. We have six months of data, the children are clearly different and it is a puzzle. And so many papers from so many countries do show symptomatic kids are relatively rare. I think it’s fairly undisputed by now. Solid review I’m sure you’ve seen. https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMms2024920 …
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I’m not disagreeing that most kids are asymptomatic. I’m disagreeing that the virus somehow behaves completely differently in them. There are loads of asymptomatic adults, too. clear increase with age in severity doesn’t have to mean kids go a “different direction” than adults
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Replying to @apoorva_nyc @zeynep and
So what I’m saying is virus may infect/transmit no difffently overall at any age. Whether someone shows symptoms or how much may just depend on age, general health, co-morbidities, immune status etc. —as with most other viruses.
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Well hopefully we will have more full population studies not just symptomatic children. I’ll leave it here, but symptomatic children doesn’t solve the puzzle at all imo. (Also, I know you don’t write the headline but I wish the headlines would reflect the sample accurately).
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