Thread by @derafeynman

🧵 on distractions in the public debated in 🇳🇱 on #COVID19NL and #scholenveilig

1: Delta is more/not more severe to children
2: There has been not so many hospitalizations
3: Focus on the protection of “vulnerable” children
And one point that is ignored:
4: Unknowns

1/19

1: Delta is more/not more aggressive to children.

While delta might be more severe to children and adults in comparison to previous variants, this is not the main point in the overall picture.
2/19

The “severity” of a virus will influence hospitalizations and long-covid cases linearly.
On the other hand, the transmissibility, R, will influence EXPONENTIALLY the amount of hospitalizations and long-covid cases.
3/19

One might try to play down COVID in children by citing some low percentage of children that are severely affected. However, an increase of the effective transmission rate, R, will increase children hospitalization and COVID exponentially.
4/19

The R will depend on the the variant per se and the measures in the community. Given the high transmissibility of delta and the lack of measures in schools/community, it is hard to argue that the value of the effective R concerning children won’t increase.
5/19
Plot: @YorickB

Having in mind the exponential effect of R, and the fact that we never had schools operating under the“flu” assumption (e.g. no quarantines), one does not need to focus on the % of kids that are severely affected.
6/19

The increase in transmissibility ALONE will be responsible for high absolute numbers. If by now one does not realize the issue with exponential increase, I give up! So, please, let’s not forget the exponential factor, this is by far the largest effect.
7/19

2: There has been not so many hospitalizations.

This is a straw man fallacy. Whatever the amount of hospitalized children was in the past, the near future is different. A different variant and a lack of measures. BTW: the past was not that great (see 🧵 bellow )
8/19

https://twitter.com/mdradvies/status/1435530472646381568

3: Focus on the protection of “vulnerable” children

“Healthy” children will also be affected. This is another distraction on the debate, just control spreading and everyone is protected!
9/19

https://twitter.com/thealiceroberts/status/1435886023456743428

Now, let´s talk about point 4 (i.e. unknowns). As pediatricians, Illy and @P_Bruijning may have experienced what happened so far with children. They cannot, however, predict long-term risks for infected children. There are many leading experts on this that must be heard.
10/19

https://twitter.com/derafeynman/status/1435150886737747968

When exposing the society to a decision on the way forward, one should ask whether the public is really informed on the possibilities that we may find in the future as consequence of infections.
11/19

https://twitter.com/andrewewing11/status/1419688098800275459

Is the Dutch public informed on the implications on children that may not require hospitalization but have to struggle with prolonged illness?
12/19

https://twitter.com/azeem_majeed/status/1435317322244411398

Is the dutch society exposed to the views of only two local pediatricians or are they aware of the position of the majority of experts worldwide?
13/19

https://twitter.com/ChandyJohnLab/status/1435106569369366528

Let´s not forget that we might have very soon the approval of vaccines for young children. Does one really wants to take the risk of infecting a large amount of children before they are vaccinated? I’m not talking on closing schools, but on basic measures!
14/19

Another point that sometimes is mentioned is that in the 🇳🇱, one doesn’t vaccinate children to protect others. First, the main goal is to protect the children. Second, let’s please be careful with dutch exceptionalism which once i called the “Dutch fallacy”.
15/19

https://twitter.com/derafeynman/status/1393258134446170115

Hence, one should also look at what is position of at least the neighbours considering children and covid to better reflect ones own perspective.
16/19

https://twitter.com/cduitsland/status/1435709351839338500

In summary one has to properly inform the society if one wants to consider any decision legitimate from a democratic point of view . ( bare in mind the numbers shown in the text bellow relate to a pre-covid period and many measures were implemented.)
17/19
sciencebasedmedicine.org/cognitive-illu…

Last but not least, let’s not forget the role of slowing down further unwanted mutations of a virus that will be adapting particularly on a young unvaccinated population.
18/19

https://twitter.com/ginnymooy/status/1435541545562869760

As usual, sorry for the typos!
18/18

Sorry, the tweet above is 19/19 ;-)

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