Massive surge in hospitalizations of babies and young kids due to COVID recorded in 2nd year of pandemic – CTV
Feb. 23, 2023
In the second year of the pandemic, hospitalizations due to COVID-19 skyrocketed more than 600 per cent among children aged 0-4 compared to the previous year, according to new data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI).
In 2020-2021, there were 325 hospitalizations of children in this cohort due to COVID-19.
But in 2021-2022, there were 2,315 hospitalizations of children aged 0-4 in Canada due to COVID-19, CIHI reports.
The data, released Thursday, shows COVID-19 was the sixth highest reason children of this age group were hospitalized.
Respiratory infections not related to COVID-19 also resurged as a cause of hospitalization for children aged 0-4 in 2021-2022. The previous year, non-COVID respiratory infections didn’t make the top 10 list of hospitalization causes for this age group at all. In 2021-2022, “other acute lower respiratory infections” were listed as the second highest reason for hospitalizations — pneumonia was number five and “acute upper respiratory infections” was number seven on the list.
