A quick thread to clear up some MAJOR misunderstandings about COVID-19 in children in the press, which have made today very stressful for me.
1/6
1/6
First, this news headline is wrong
They read our excellent review, and took a quote from a single article (joint WHO/China commission) out of our entire review for the headline
Children almost certainly DO transmit COVID-19
dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8…
2/6
They read our excellent review, and took a quote from a single article (joint WHO/China commission) out of our entire review for the headline
Children almost certainly DO transmit COVID-19
dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8…
2/6
This report on viral transmission is based on a (currently) very flawed study (unpublished but online)
theguardian.com/world/2020/apr…
I will explain why.
Firstly it did not report the population sampled for testing - if they are all unwell, very different to population screening
3/6
theguardian.com/world/2020/apr…
I will explain why.
Firstly it did not report the population sampled for testing - if they are all unwell, very different to population screening
3/6
Second, they analysed age by arbitrary categories, not as a continuous variable. This is a big no no - loses statistical power.
But wait - somewhere in the paper they did a Kruskal-wallis test. What did they find?
A SIGNIFICANT correlation of viral load with age (p=0.01)
4/6
But wait - somewhere in the paper they did a Kruskal-wallis test. What did they find?
A SIGNIFICANT correlation of viral load with age (p=0.01)
4/6
The paper is basically un-interpretable as it stands without knowing the population, but it certainly DOES NOT show children have the same viral load as adults.
Could it be the case? Who knows. This certainly doesn't suggest so.
5/6
Could it be the case? Who knows. This certainly doesn't suggest so.
5/6
So where do we stand?
We don't know for sure but growing evidence suggests children are less susceptible to infection, have milder infection, and are infrequently responsible for household transmission.
See more here.
dontforgetthebubbles.com/evidence-summa…
End.
6/6
We don't know for sure but growing evidence suggests children are less susceptible to infection, have milder infection, and are infrequently responsible for household transmission.
See more here.
dontforgetthebubbles.com/evidence-summa…
End.
6/6
Oh I'll add this graph here too in case it helps
This report on viral transmission is based on a (currently) very flawed study (unpublished but online)
theguardian.com/world/2020/apr…
I will explain why.
Firstly it did not report the population sampled for testing - if they are all unwell, very different to population screening
3/6
theguardian.com/world/2020/apr…
I will explain why.
Firstly it did not report the population sampled for testing - if they are all unwell, very different to population screening
3/6
