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Covid more lethal to children in this wave? Top US Doctor explains

by Vaishali Sharma
COVID-19

More children are becoming COVID positive in this period, according to Dr Faheem Younus, Chief of Infectious Diseases at the University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Health in the United States, who is a renowned medical specialist. This is not because the coronavirus is more harmful for children. Because total infections are substantially greater than in previous rounds of the Covid-19 epidemic, this is the case.

Dr Faheem while speaking to news agency ANI said,”There is a belief with Omicron variant of Covid-19 that it tends to infect the upper respiratory tract more as compared to our lungs and lower respiratory tract. Children have anatomically their upper respiratory tract in a developing phase. So that’s probably one of the reasons that we’re seeing more hospitalizations. But by and large, children are still doing much better than adults and people who are elderly and immunocompromised.”

In a detailed interaction with ANI, the doctor also said that people who got infected with Delta are now coming back with Omicron. Those who get Omicron will not have complete immunity against reinfections from future variants.

On  people getting herd immunity due to the prevalent Omicron variant  of Covid-19, Dr Younus said that Every time an individual get infected with any variant, it build up some immunity. It does give you a better chance to fight the virus in the future.  He suggested that people must take all precaution to get infected , but if an individual gets infected,  the body is clearly not as naive.

Further explaining the importance of boosters by giving an example of our body’s requirement of water, Dr Faheem said, “When you drink a glass of water in the morning, you drink another glass in the afternoon you drink another glass at night, right? That one glass is not enough. It’s not going to last you for months. And when you drink that second or third glass, no one says why you’re drinking water again we all understand right? So similarly your immune system cannot last forever. On one shot. It needs repeated reminders, boosters, this is nothing unusual. Other vaccines also require repeated doses. So that’s why it’s important. If people had their vaccine 6,8,10, 12 months ago. That’s like having a glass of water last week.”

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