Admissions doubled for kids with virus

The number of children admitted to KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital (KKH) for both Covid-19 and non-Covid-19 related respiratory symptoms has doubled over the past seven weeks.

Associate Professor Thoon Koh Cheng, head of the infectious disease service in the department of paediatrics at KKH, said there has been a doubling of such admissions since the start of December last year to the first three weeks of this month.

More children who need hospital admission are presented with Covid-19 symptoms that are “not mild”, he added.

Nearly half of these patients with symptoms that are not mild are under five years of age and do not yet qualify for Covid-19 vaccination, he noted, adding the rest are mostly unvaccinated children aged between five and 12.

On Jan 21, Singapore’s director of medical services Kenneth Mak said children aged below 12 are starting to make up the majority of Covid-19 cases that are admitted to hospitals.

Prof Mak added that KKH and National University Hospital (NUH) also reported that they are seeing more children with Covid-19 and non-Covid-19-related respiratory symptoms who require admission.

Without giving figures, Prof Thoon said the rate of increase in children admitted with Covid-19 and non-Covid-19 related respiratory symptoms is “about more than double in a week”.

He attributed the rise in children with non-Covid-19-related respiratory symptoms being admitted to hospital to “increasingly close and social contacts in the community, coupled with likely complacency from fatigue to pandemic restrictions”.

This comes amid a surge in local cases this month due to the more infectious Omicron variant.

A total of 17,699 children below the age of 12 have been infected with Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic, with 2,586 hospitalised, said Health Minister Ong Ye Kung in a Facebook post on Sunday. — The Straits Times/ANN