Department of Pediatrics, Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, Seoul, Korea.
Department of Mathematics, Konkuk University, Seoul, Korea.
J Korean Med Sci. 2020 Nov 30;35(46):e414. doi: 10.3346/jkms.2020.35.e414.
Data on severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 transmission from a pediatric index patient to others at the school setting are limited. Epidemiological data on pediatric coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases after school opening are warranted.
We analyzed data of the pediatric patients with COVID-19 collected from the press release of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Information on the school opening delay and re-opening policies were achieved from the press release of the Korean Ministry of Education.
The school openings were delayed three times in March 2020. Online classes started from April 9, and off-line (in-person) classes started from May 20 to June 8 at four steps in different grades of students. There was no sudden increase in pediatric cases after the school opening, and the proportion of pediatric cases among total confirmed cases in the nation around 7.0%. As of July 31, 44 children from 38 schools and kindergartens were diagnosed with COVID-19 after off-line classes started. More than 13,000 students and staffs were tested; only one additional student was found to be infected in the same classroom. The proportions of pediatric patients without information on infection sources were higher in older age groups than in younger age groups (17.4% vs. 52.4%, = 0.014). In the younger age group, 78.3% of children were infected by family members, while only 23.8% of adolescents in the older age group were infected by family members ( < 0.001).
Korea had a successful transition from school closure to online and off-line school opening, which did not cause significant school-related outbreak among the pediatric population.
关于儿童索引病例在学校环境中向他人传播严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒 2 的数据有限。有必要获得有关开学后儿童 2019 年冠状病毒病（COVID-19）病例的流行病学数据。
我们分析了从韩国疾病控制与预防中心新闻稿中收集的 COVID-19 儿科患者的数据。关于开学延迟和重新开放政策的信息是从韩国教育部的新闻稿中获得的。
2020 年 3 月，学校开学时间推迟了三次。从 4 月 9 日开始在线课程，然后在不同年级的学生中分四步从 5 月 20 日至 6 月 8 日开始线下（面对面）课程。开学后儿童病例没有突然增加，全国确诊病例中儿童病例的比例约为 7.0%。截至 7 月 31 日，线下课程开始后，有 38 所学校和幼儿园的 44 名儿童被诊断出患有 COVID-19。对 13000 多名学生和教职员工进行了检测；仅在同一教室发现一名学生感染。在年龄较大的组中，无感染源信息的儿科患者比例高于年龄较小的组（17.4%比 52.4%， = 0.014）。在年龄较小的组中，78.3%的儿童是由家庭成员感染的，而在年龄较大的组中，只有 23.8%的青少年是由家庭成员感染的（<0.001）。
韩国成功地从学校关闭过渡到在线和线下开学，这并没有在儿科人群中引起重大的学校相关疫情。
