A Look at DESE's Cited Sources: Footnote #11 and #71 - Susceptibility to and transmission of COVID-19 amongst children and adolescents compared with adults: a systematic review and meta-analysis

DESE Claim 1 (footnote #11): "If exposed, children may be less likely to become infected with COVID-19. A meta-analysis of studies from several countries found that children were only 44% as likely as adults to become infected after exposure (note: pre-print study)."

DESE Claim 2 (footnote #71): "A meta-analysis of studies from several countries found that children were only 44% as likely as adults to become infected after exposure."

Cited Source: Viner, R. M., Mytton, O. T., Bonell, C., Melendez-Torres, G. J., Ward, J. L., Hudson, L., ... & Panovska-Griffiths, J. (2020). Susceptibility to and transmission of COVID-19 amongst children and adolescents compared with adults: a systematic review and meta-analysis. medRxiv. Available at https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.20.20108126v1

Peer reviewed?: no, preprint

Study Methodology: Study meta-analysis "rapid systematic review of contact-tracing studies and population-screening studies"

Notes: This study examines 18 studies. "Studies were of predominantly low and medium quality." Children seemed to have less susceptibility to COVID-19 infection in the studies examined. However, they were more likely to be asymptomatic and the true infection rate likely isn't fully understood because of lack of testing for asymptomatic people who have not have known close contact with someone who has COVID-19.

"The role that children and young people play in transmission of SARS-CoV-2 by is dependent upon multiple factors, including their risk of exposure to potential infection, their probability of being infected upon exposure (susceptibility), the extent to which they develop symptoms upon infection or remain asymptomatic, the extent to which they develop a viral load sufficiently high to transmit and their propensity for making potentially infectious contact with others, dependent upon numbers of social contacts across age-groups and behaviour during those contacts."

One of the most important statements in the report is "Few studies have examined transmission in school settings." There are a lot of unknowns about COVID-19 transmission in schools. COVID-19 amongst children is important to understand, but so is the specific impact of schools on COVID-19 transmission among children and adults.

 

Supports DESE Claim 1?: Yes. Again, this does not predict adult safety in the school environment at all. Only one infected adult or child exposes a lot of people to COVID-19 in a school.

Supports DESE Claim 2? Yes