Idaho’s unchecked spread of the highly contagious delta variant is sending more kids and babies to hospitals with complications from COVID-19, state health care professionals said Wednesday.
Major hospitals and health care clinics in southwestern Idaho are seeing more premature babies born to COVID-19-positive mothers, more children requiring hospitalization and more kids of all ages experiencing mental health problems because of the pandemic. That’s according to several doctors from Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center, St. Luke’s Health System, Primary Health Group and Mountain States Neonatology.
Numbers from the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare show weekly coronavirus case counts are increasing more rapidly in children than in adults. There were nearly 1,700 new COVID-19 cases reported in children in Idaho last week, deputy state epidemiologist Dr. Kathryn Turner said Tuesday, double the rate the state saw in August. More than 200 children have had to be hospitalized for COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic, Turner said.
Lately Idaho doctors are also seeing an increase in stillbirths with no discernable medical reason other than the mother had COVID-19, said Dr. Lauren Miller, the perinatal health director at St. Luke’s Health System. The CDC on Wednesday issued an urgent recommendation that anyone who is pregnant, is trying to get pregnant, was recently pregnant, or who is lactating, to get vaccinated against COVID-19. The agency said August saw record high numbers of coronavirus-related deaths in pregnant women in a single month.
Idaho remains one of the nation’s least-vaccinated states, with roughly 52% of eligible residents fully vaccinated, accorChildrending to the state health department. (AP)
