US hospitals admit more children with COVID-19

More children than ever have been treated for COVID-19 in hospitals in the United States as the Delta variant hits communities.

Hospitalizations for children with COVID-19 have spiked and reached their highest levels last week, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which said the rate was 30 percent above the previous peak.

More than 180,000 children tested positive for the coronavirus last week, a 7 percent increase in cases since the beginning of the month. Child cases have had a fourfold increase in the past month, rising from about 38,000 at the end of July to 180,000 the past week, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. For the week ending Thursday, children accounted for 22.4 percent of new cases.

While the US Food and Drug Administration granted full approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for people aged 16 and older on Monday, children under the ages of 12 are not yet eligible to be vaccinated. Vaccination rates for those between the age of 12 and 17 also remain relatively low.

Pfizer's vaccine was first approved for emergency use in December. It continues to be available under emergency use authorization for young people aged 12 to 15 and for the administration of a third booster shot for immunocompromised individuals.

The full approval came as the Delta variant is driving up infection rates and COVID-19 patients are filling hospitals across the country.

According to the CDC, 54.7 percent of teenagers aged 16 and 17 have received one dose of the vaccine. Among those aged 12 to 15, that number is 45.4 percent－the lowest vaccination rate for any age group.

As of Aug 18, hospitals were tending to an average of more than 1,200 children a day, twice the figure from the end of July and four times more from the start of July, according to an NBC News analysis based on data released by the Health and Human Services Department.

Pediatric hospitalizations are the highest in Alabama, Florida, Delaware, Louisiana and Oklahoma. With the exception of Delaware, full vaccination rates in these states are below the average national rate.

Children's hospitals are facing more cases as schools reopen. Thousands of school-age children were quarantined over the past week due to coronavirus outbreaks in schools.

In Florida, nearly 20,000 students and school employees had to be quarantined after more than 6,000 coronavirus cases were identified among the state's 15 largest school districts since the start of school.

Children's Hospital New Orleans has had as many as 20 children hospitalized for COVID-19 at a time in the past three weeks, said Mark Kline, the hospital's physician-in-chief, to The Wall Street Journal. Kline said the number never exceeded seven in 2020.

Delta infections

About half of the children hospitalized recently did not have underlying conditions, he said, whereas before the Delta variant arrived, most children who were hospitalized for COVID-19 had other health issues such as asthma or diabetes. Kline said he suspects the Delta variant likely does cause more severe disease in children than other variants.

Pfizer plans to seek booster authorization as well as full approval of its vaccine for people aged 12 to 15. Moderna, whose vaccine under emergency use authorization adopts similar mRNA technology, is in the process of completing data submission for its request for full approval. Johnson& Johnson plans to file for full approval later.

Pfizer plans to market the vaccine under the name Comirnaty. It took the FDA less than four months to grant Pfizer the approval, though the normal time frame is about 10 months.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, more than 37.9 million people in the US have been infected, and more than 629,400 have died from COVID-19, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.