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Long COVID in Young Children, School-Aged Children, and Teens

jamanetwork.com

Just a moment...

Any teachers here? Would 10-20% of your class having long term trouble with memory or focusing be disruptive to the learning process? With really young children, how could you even tell something changed for the worse after a viral infection?

Long COVID is common, affecting up to 10% to 20% of children with a history of COVID-19. With almost 6 million US children potentially affected, this is higher than the number of children with asthma, the most common chronic health problem in children.

Don't worry, AI can do the work for them.

2 comments
  • I started teaching about 10 years ago, but it’s only been since 2020 that I’ve taught the same age groups.

    I can tell you that the pandemic is so memory holed for most teaches that even when I bring up my concerns about long COVID to them, while I’m wearing a mask like I do everyday, they will insist simultaneously that

    1. “These students (mainly later elementary) are the COVID group. They’re going to be behind no matter what.”
    2. “There students (mainly younger elementary) are just raised by iPads now and don’t have much of an attention span.”
    • I wish I was surprised, but no one seems to want to acknowledge that the virus causes brain damage. With unvaccinated kids getting the worst of it.

      It's kind of baffling to me that people attribute remote learning the cause of everything. Like, it wasn't ideal, and outright sucked depending on where you lived, but not learning a lot for six months doesn't cause permanent damage. Every school year is made up of kids of different age ranges, it's not like if a child hasn't learned a certain math level by the time they are 145 months old they are fucked forever. It's also not going to destroy their attention span or ability to focus. A virus that crosses the blood-brain barrier can cause those problems. So will having your family ravaged or killed by disease.

      I know covid isn't the sole cause of problems today, but it's the elephant in the room.