Are Children Susceptible to Kawasaki Disease Because of COVID-19?

The NAPster emails:

What are you hearing or reading about this "new" issue?

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/coronavirus-pandemic-twenty-eight-children-hospitalized-with-inflammatory-syndrome-linked-to-covid-19/

RW response:

The link is to a National Review story which begins:

Although COVID-19 continues to pose much less risk to children than to adults, reports in March that not a single child had died from the disease were apparently too good to be true.

Earlier this month, government officials in New York State became aware of about 100 children who had come down with a serious condition called Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome (MIS-C), likely due to earlier coronavirus infections.

 “The condition, called pediatric multisystem inflammatory syndrome, has been reported in about 100 children in New York State, including three who died, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said this week,” the New York Times reported on May 13. “Cases have been reported in other states, including Louisiana, Mississippi and California, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said it will soon issue an alert asking doctors to report cases of children with symptoms of the syndrome.”

In the past ten days, two dozen children with the syndrome were admitted to Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C.

This is otherwise known as Kawasaki disease.

According to the University of Chicago Pediatrics Clerkship, the incidence is 2/100,000/yr in blacks and Caucasians and 5/100,000/yr. in Asians, so you would expect more than 400 cases in New York state and there appear to be peaks in summer and winter so New York state officials "becoming aware" of 100 cases does not suggest much of a difference from what would normally be occurring.

Children's National Hospital probably serves a region greater than Washington D.C. itself, so you would have to know the region it services before determining if there is anything above normal in the region. But two dozen cases does not seem to be anything above normal either.

These kinds of reports are very scarce on details. For example, I would like to know the age of the children, etc. to understand if the age is significantly different from the normal ages at which Kawasaki disease normally infects children.

It is really fearmongering to put this stuff out without more detail, especially when the little detail provided suggests nothing out of the normal in terms of the number of cases.

Of course, over time, studies will be done to determine if COVID-19 was likely to be responsible for some of these infections.

That said, I have no problem with parents who want to shelter their children from those infected with COVID-19 but if you are asking if this is a reason to continue the lockdown, My answer is "No."

People can self-isolate on their own and have their children do so also, but they should really leave me alone.