Thirty-seven percent of children and adolescents hospitalized with COVID-19 had neurological symptoms, a study conducted by National Taiwan University Hospital (NTUH) found.
Two of them had a stroke after developing encephalitis, the hospital told a news conference on Friday morning to promote COVID-19 vaccinations for children.
NTUH Department of Pediatrics director Lee Wang-tso (李旺祚) said the hospital worked with more than a dozen other hospitals to established a reporting system for people aged 18 or younger who were diagnosed with COVID-19.
Photo courtesy of the National Taiwan University Hospital via CNA
Among the 1,163 cases in its database, 404 were hospitalized, 148 of whom, or 37 percent, exhibited neurological symptoms, including 13 cases, or 9 percent, with suspected or confirmed encephalitis, he said.
Of the 13 juvenile cases, two had a stroke, Lee said, adding that they recovered after treatment.
One of them is a 12-year-old boy who developed weakness in the right leg and a fever after he was diagnosed with COVID-19, Lee said, adding that pathological changes were found in his blood vessels, the left side of his brain and his right frontal lobe.
The boy’s limb weakness improved after treatment, he said.
The other case is an eight-year-old boy, who developed a fever, convulsions and abnormal liver function after being diagnosed with COVID-19, he said.
The child developed inflamation and local ischemia, and pathological changes were found in his blood vessels, Lee said.
The boy recovered after receiving intravenous immunoglobulin and remdesivir, and was discharged from hospital, he added.
Lee said the data showed that the risk children infected with the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 develop encephalitis or encephalitis-like symptoms is nearly 10 times higher than for children infected with the initial variants of the virus.
Although children who have the disease rarely have a stroke, pathological changes in their blood vessels pose an increased risk that should not be neglected.
Nearly half of the cases examined using magnetic resonance spectroscopy showed cerebral vascular changes, Lee said.
Children are also at risk of developing multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) after recovering from acute COVID-19, he said, adding that this risk should not be neglected either.
Department deputy director Chang Luan-yin (張鑾英) said that most of the cases in the database were unvaccinated.
However, as the vaccination rate among children aged five to 11 has increased, fewer cases have been reported, Chang added.
National Taiwan University Children’s Hospital superintendent Huang Li-min (黃立民) said that vaccination is the most important way to prevent severe COVID-19 complications and MIS-C, so the hospital encourages parents to bring their children to get vaccinated as early as possible.
Additional reporting by CNA
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