Thread by @ehaspel

THREAD: Something I want to emphasize (this article was long enough already...) is the evidence young-child-to-adult transmission of COVID-19 is *very* rare -- EVEN in close-quarter households! This is hugely important, given rightful concern for staff.

earlylearningnation.com/2020/06/opinio…

I cited this key quote from epidemiologist Daniel Halperin: "Remarkably, contact tracing studies in China, Iceland, Britain and the Netherlands failed to locate a single case of child-to-adult infection out of thousands of transmission events analyzed.” /

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/…

There's a lot more. Here's the EU CDC: "In the investigation of the first outbreak in France, one
infected child attended three different schools while symptomatic & despite 112 contacts identified(including children and teachers), no symptomatic secondary cases were detected." /

And from Australia: "Child-to-adult transmission was likely in only one household involving a 17-year-old and his father," the report said. None of the other eight children appear to have infected other members of their household." /

smh.com.au/national/nsw/s…

The AAP notes a study "published in Pediatrics earlier [in May] in which 96% of the children with COVID-19 lived with adults who were infected first. In a related commentary, Benjamin Lee, M.D, FAAP, and William V. Raszka Jr., M.D., FAAP, cited a study in France, which found.../

...an infected student did not appear to infect 80 classmates with whom he had contact. In Australia, infections among nine students and nine staff across 15 schools led to just two secondary infections, both in students." /

aappublications.org/news/2020/05/2…

I could go on. Now, does this mean young-child-to-adult transmission is impossible? NO. It can and surely does occasionally happen. But if it happened more than that, **we would know by now**. 96% adult-to-child transmission WITHIN FAMILIES is astoundingly one-directional. /

I emphasize the "within families" because that's the least controlled environment. Families do not physically distance or wear masks indoors. They're not obsessively cleaning every toy each time it is touched. And still, the kids basically just aren't giving it to the adults. /

(and yes, I know that adults have likely been going out into the world a lot more than kids and so have many more opportunities to bring COVID home, but add in the lack of child-to-adult transmission in school settings and that doesn't work as a wave-away explanation) /

What all this means - and what I've been trying to emphasize over and over again - is that where we need to put our resources is on **protecting adults from each other**. Adults should wear masks. Adults should not congregate or spend much time near each other. Be prudent! BUT...

Let the little ones bring their loveys! Let them play together! Let there be more or less normally sized groups! Let their teachers help them without stress! It's heartbreaking to see & hear the fear from providers and parents, when the fear just doesn't match the evidence. /end