Older Kids May Transmit COVID-19 as Much as Adults Do, New Evidence Shows Part 1

新證據(jù)表明，年齡較大的孩子可能會(huì)像成年人一樣傳播新冠肺炎（上）

Since the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, scientists and health authorities have often observed that children do not appear to contract and transmit the virus to the same extent as adults.

自從新冠病毒大流行爆發(fā)以來(lái)，科學(xué)家和衛(wèi)生當(dāng)局常觀察到兒童似乎沒有像成年人那樣感染和傳播病毒。

While the mechanisms behind this reduced vulnerability have remained somewhat mysterious and speculative, new evidence from South Korea shows that the age of children is also a vital factor to consider, with a large study indicating that older children seem to spread coronavirus on par with adults, even if younger children do not.

雖然這種易感染性降低背后的機(jī)制仍然有些神秘，備受猜測(cè)，但來(lái)自韓國(guó)的新證據(jù)表明，兒童的年齡也是一個(gè)需要考慮的重要因素。一項(xiàng)大型研究表明，年齡較大的兒童似乎與成年人一樣傳播冠狀病毒，而年齡較小的兒童并非如此。

A research team led by preventive medicine physician Young Joon Park from the Korea Centres for Disease Control and Prevention examined South Korean contact tracing reports from when the first case of COVID-19 was identified in the country on January 20, up until March 27.

由韓國(guó)疾病控制和預(yù)防中心的預(yù)防醫(yī)學(xué)醫(yī)生Young Joon Park領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的一個(gè)研究小組對(duì)韓國(guó)從1月20日發(fā)現(xiàn)首例新冠肺炎病例到3月27日的接觸者追蹤報(bào)告進(jìn)行了檢查。

During this window, 5,706 index patients were identified, meaning confirmed cases who were the first people identified as having COVID-19 in an investigated cluster or setting.

在這段時(shí)間內(nèi)，研究人員確定了5706名指示病例，這意味著確診的病例是第一批被確認(rèn)為在調(diào)查的集群或環(huán)境中患有新冠肺炎的人。

Contact tracing efforts chased up and tested 59,073 people who had contact with these confirmed cases, and it showed that, as expected, people living in the same household as an infected person are the most likely to get the virus.

接觸者追蹤工作追查并檢測(cè)了59073名與這些確診病例有過(guò)接觸的人，結(jié)果顯示，正如預(yù)期的那樣，與感染者住在同一個(gè)家庭的人最有可能感染病毒。

Among 10,592 of these household contacts tested in the study, 11.8 percent of people ended up also having COVID-19, whereas just 1.9 percent of non-household contacts (48,481 individuals all up) had the virus.

在研究測(cè)試的10592名家庭接觸者中，11.8%的人最終也感染了新冠肺炎，與之相比只有1.9%的非家庭接觸者（總數(shù)共48481人）感染了新冠肺炎。

"Higher household than non-household detection might partly reflect transmission during social distancing, when family members largely stayed home except to perform essential tasks, possibly creating spread within the household," the researchers explain in their study, which is in early release.

研究人員在他們的研究中解釋說(shuō)：“家庭比非家庭的病毒感染率更高，這可能在一定程度上反映了保持社交距離期間的病毒傳播。這段時(shí)間，家庭成員除了進(jìn)行基本活動(dòng)外，大部分時(shí)間都呆在家里，可能造成了家庭內(nèi)部的傳播?！边@項(xiàng)研究現(xiàn)已提前發(fā)布。

翻譯：MS小冰晶