Kids with COVID-19 should wear masks, keep distance at home

When children have COVID-19, social distancing and mask wearing at home can dramatically reduce transmission of the virus to family members, according to researchers who tracked an outbreak at an overnight summer camp in the U.S. state of Georgia.

Overall, 224 children became infected with the coronavirus; in 18% of their households, at least 48 others caught the virus from the kids, according to the researchers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Georgia Department of Public Health.

They said 10 percent of the adults who became sick with COVID-19 ended up hospitalized. Compared with siblings, parents were 2.3 times more likely to test positive for COVID-19, and extended family members – particularly grandparents – were 6.6 times more likely.

Sharing meals, being within 6 feet (1.8 meters) of the infected kid for 15 minutes or more, being face-to-face with the child, and having direct physical contact with the child all increased household members’ risk of infection.

The chance of spread was reduced by 60% if the child practiced social distancing at home and by 50% if the child wore a mask while around other people, the researchers reported Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

“When feasible,” they concluded, “children and adolescents with a known exposure to SARS-CoV-2 or a diagnosis of COVID-19 should remain at home and maintain physical distance from household members.”