Long COVID conditions in kids include heart issues, blood clots & more, CDC study says
For children and teens who have gotten COVID-19, there is a higher chance they may develop certain health conditions — including heart issues, blood clots, and more — in the weeks following an infection, according to a new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study.
Known as long COVID, the CDC describes it as “new, recurring, or ongoing health problems” that could appear at least four weeks after catching COVID-19.
While several studies have examined long COVID conditions and symptoms in adults, there is less data about long COVID in children and teenagers, the CDC notes.
In the study, the most common post-COVID conditions in patients ages 0 to 17 were blood clots in the lungs and veins, heart problems including myocarditis and cardiomyopathy, kidney failure and type 1 diabetes, according to the research.
These conditions are “rare or uncommon” for children and teens who have never gotten COVID-19 and are “potentially serious,” the study noted.
The research analyzed medical claims of 781,419 younger patients in the U.S. who had laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 and, to compare, 2,344,257 children and teens that never had a reported case of the virus from March 2020 through January 2022, according to the CDC.
The findings come a few months after the agency reported 1 in 5 adults in the U.S. may develop at least one long COVID-19 symptom in May.
For adults, the most common long COVID conditions were found by the CDC to be respiratory symptoms and musculoskeletal pain, according to the prior study.
In comparison, respiratory signs and symptoms were a less likely long COVID condition in children and teens, the CDC found in its latest study. However, musculoskeletal pain was considered one of the more likely ones.
Blood clots a concern for long-COVID kids
After a COVID-19 infection, children and teens were roughly two times as likely to develop acute pulmonary embolism, when a blood clot travels to the lung, as well as myocarditis and cardiomyopathy, compared to those who have not had the virus, according to the study.
Myocarditis is when the heart muscle becomes inflamed, and cardiomyopathy is a heart muscle disease that can make pumping blood more difficult.
Meanwhile, individuals ages 0 to 17 were 1.87 times more likely to experience blood clots in the veins, and 1.32 times more likely to have kidney failure, the CDC found. Additionally, these age groups were 1.23 times more likely to develop type 1 diabetes.
Other long COVID conditions children and teens were likely to develop after a COVID-19 infection, according to the study, include:
Coagulation and hemorrhagic disorders
Type 2 diabetes
Changes in smell and taste
Irregular heartbeat
Circulatory symptoms
Malaise and fatigue
Musculoskeletal pain
They were less likely to develop symptoms of mental conditions, sleeping disorders, neurological conditions, anxiety, fear-related and mood disorders, muscle disorders, the CDC found.
One study limitation included how individuals considered as not having COVID-19 might have been misclassified if they had an infection that was not documented, the agency noted.
The study said that the findings can be used to inform health care workers “about new symptoms and conditions that occur among children and adolescents in the months after SARS-CoV-2 infection.”
In the U.S. roughly 28 million working-age adults, and likely more, have developed long COVID, workforce expert Katie Bach, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, testified at a House subcommittee hearing on July 19, McClatchy News previously reported.
The CDC’s findings come as the omicron BA.5 subvariant continues to spread and made up more than 85% of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. for the week ending July 30, according to agency data.
This story was originally published August 4, 2022 at 3:59 PM with the headline "Long COVID conditions in kids include heart issues, blood clots & more, CDC study says."
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