Corona virus: How dangerous is Corona for babies?
Many parents are worried about their baby’s health during the Corona crisis. In this article you can read how dangerous the corona virus is for babies.
How dangerous the coronavirus is for babies
Even if children do not belong to the risk group of COVID-19, there are already some cases in which small children have been infected. New parents in particular are now worried about their offspring.
- In England, a mother and her newborn recently fell ill with the corona virus. Both tested positive for the respiratory infection. It is not yet clear whether the baby may have been infected in the womb .
- However , the Robert Koch Institute assumes that infants are only infected after birth through physical proximity to sick people and through droplet infections.
- Physicians assess the disease for infants as harmless. Even when babies or young children are affected by the virus, they usually show very mild symptoms such as a slight fever or a slight cough.
- As a study from China shows, children not only fall ill less severely, but also much less frequently than adults with COVID-19. Only 1.3 percent of 745 children who had first contact with people infected with the corona virus contracted it.
- In ten observed children between two months and 15 years, no pneumonia could be detected in the random sample. The fever was below 39 degrees Celsius.
- One child showed no symptoms at all despite being ill.
How to protect your baby from Corona
Since so far little is known about babies infected with Corona, the uncertainty among parents with newborns and small children is increasing. If you follow the federal government’s guidelines, you can do a lot to prevent your baby from becoming infected.
- Parents should take their child’s bed literally with their newborn and stay at home for the most part over the next few weeks.
- Even older babies and toddlers should only have contact with the people living in the household and avoid other points of infection. This also includes grandparents, toddler groups or playgrounds.
- Mothers should cough into the crook of their arm and wash their hands thoroughly. You should ensure adequate hygiene , especially before breastfeeding or feeding the baby.
- According to the current status of the Robert Koch Institute, breast milk is not considered a carrier of the corona virus – breastfeeding therefore poses no danger even for infected mothers.