Over 110,000 child COVID-19 cases reported in U.S. in past week

LOS ANGELES, May 31 (Xinhua) -- More than 112,000 child COVID-19 cases were reported in the United States during the past week, a doubling of case counts from the four weeks prior, according to the latest report by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the Children's Hospital Association.

It marks the seventh consecutive weekly increase in child COVID-19 cases in the United States, said the report published on Tuesday.

Almost 13.4 million children have tested positive for COVID-19 since the onset of the pandemic in the country, and almost 376,000 of these cases have been added in the past four weeks, according to the report.

Nearly 5.5 million child COVID-19 cases have been added nationwide so far in 2022.

Children represent 18.9 percent of all COVID-19 cases in the United States, according to the report.

There is an urgent need to collect more age-specific data to assess the severity of illness related to new variants as well as potential longer-term effects, said the AAP.

"It is important to recognize there are immediate effects of the pandemic on children's health, but importantly we need to identify and address the long-lasting impacts on the physical, mental, and social well-being of this generation of children and youth," it said.