Are schools committing too much in COVID-19 testing for children? Is it necessary, or does unnecessary fear instigating it?
Is COVID-19 testing for children essential?
Professor Russel Viner from UCL and the President of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health argues that COVID-19 testing for children attending school is unnecessary and just a waste of resources. His claim is supported by a recent study on COVID-19 transmission in humans, saying that children have less than 40 percent probability of acquiring the virus as compared to adults. Viner was also pushing for the full reopening of schools in the U.K. as it promotes better mental health on children as compared to the possibilities of them being infected by the virus.
For Viner, schools are being too cautious in conducting numerous COVID-19 testing for children on their campuses. Understandably, they are just cautious, but, with recent studies favoring the claim of less transmission in children, it is about time to divert those fears and funding into something more helpful and productive for the children.
Viner advocates that schools should be the last establishment that the government should consider being closed. In his medical journal, he discussed that children and teenagers are less likely to be virus carriers, which means they are less susceptible to the virus. His theory is that susceptibility is closely related to virus transmission.
Common flu mistook as COVID-19
Professor Viner also pointed out that the weather has been a great factor in all the misconceptions related to COVID-19 in children. Cases of winter colds, runny nose, and coughing should not be directly associated with COVID-19. Certain weather conditions may attribute to flu-like illness in children, which explains all the symptoms. However, COVID-19 related symptoms are much worse, such as constant coughing, loss of appetite, and high fever.
It is not healthy for a child to undergo COVID-19 testing just because of the flu, as the symptoms show.
