Nemours Children’s Health reporting increasing in child COVID-19 hospitalizations

DELAWARE – COVID-19 is sending more and more children to the hospital in the First State. “In prior waves, we would see zero, one, two, three children per day in the hospital with COVID-19. So, today, seeing them in the mid teens right now is still a huge increase over what we saw before,” said Jonathan Miller, Chief of Primary Care Pediatrics at Nemours Children’s Health.

Miller says while that increase may not seem significant, parents should still be doing everything they can to protect their kids from COVID-19. Vaccination should be one of the top items on parents’ list, according to Miller. “There’s still a lot of children out there who either haven’t had their first shot, or haven’t had their complete series. So, that’s their second shot or their booster if they’re old enough to get it,” he said. “I encourage people to go out and get it as soon as possible. Beyond that, I think people still need to be thinking about this wave [of the pandemic].”

Aside from getting their children fully vaccinated, Miller says parents should also continue to encourage safety precautions, like hand-washing, social distancing, and mask wearing. “We’re still in the middle of this wave, and I think there’s a bit of a false narrative out there that we are past it. I think we’re past the worst of it. But, it’s still spreading pretty quickly through kids in the community, and we’re still seeing the ramifications of that at the hospital,” he said.

Miller says he also encourages parents and guardians to get their kids a flu shot as well.