A study co-authored by BC’s top doctor says 80% of children and teens have had COVID-19

VANCOUVER — A study co-authored by British Columbia’s top doctor says at least 70 to 80 percent of children and adolescents in Greater Vancouver and the Fraser Valley have been infected with COVID-19.

The study that Dr. Listing Bonnie Henry among 13 authors says that by contrast, 60 to 70 percent of adults aged 20 to 59 and about 40 percent of those over 60 have been infected.

The preprint study, which was not peer-reviewed and was published on the medRxiv website on Sept. 9, drew criticism from an advocacy group whose spokesman called it “extremely damning” to Henry’s own policies and assurances to parents.

dr Lyne Filiatrault, who speaks for Protect Our Province BC, a group of health professionals, scientists and advocates who say they want evidence-based guidelines, said the study shows a large increase in infections during the school year in children under 10.

“This basically documents how children became infected and takes no responsibility for misleading parents into believing that schools are safe,” Filiatraut said on Tuesday, adding that the spread of the virus in daycare centers is a cause for concern the parents gave.

The study says surveillance reports of infections had underestimated the actual level of infection by 92 times between March and August.

The study says the infection rate for all ages in BC’s Lower Mainland rose from under 15 percent to about 60 percent between October last year and this August, as the highly infectious Omicron variant took hold.

It is based on 14,000 anonymized blood samples drawn from a network of ambulatory laboratories between March 2020 and this August.

A Health Department spokesman said Henry is not expected to be available to comment on the study until Thursday during a press briefing on COVID-19 modeling numbers.

Lead author Danuta Skowronski, an epidemiologist who focuses on emerging respiratory pathogens at the BC Center for Disease Control, was also unavailable.

Filiatrault said one of the most harrowing aspects of the study was the authors’ claim that the level of infection combined with vaccination resulted in “more robust hybrid immunity”.

She said there has been a lack of acknowledgment of a heavy toll COVID has taken for so long on some children and parents who may have been infected by youngsters, in the absence of early action to curb the spread in classrooms.

Filiatrault said Henry’s reassurances that COVID-19 spread primarily in the community and not in schools did not reflect the reality of childhood infections, and this has now been backed up by the study’s findings.

“This study puts in a nutshell what happened in this province and it’s fundamentally extremely damning,” she said, adding that masks should be mandatory in schools.

“If we continue as we have been, we are on a dangerous path. What has happened is that children have gone home and infected their parents and their multi-generational families. And that affects the economy.”

Kyenta Martins, who speaks for the parent-led group Safe Schools Coalition BC, said the study confirms parents’ concerns about ventilation in schools

“A lot of people rang the alarm bell. I’m one of many, and I hate that term, but[we were]gas lit by Henry and many officers,” she said.

“All this time information has been coming out from various scientists, aerosol experts and studies detailing what we have been saying that schools are a site of transmission because you are in close contact.”

Martins said she would like to know how school boards have been spending federal money channeled through the province to improve air quality, especially as COVID-19 cases are expected to increase this fall.

This report from The Canadian Press was first published on September 13, 2022.

Camille Bains, The Canadian Press