Symptom Profiles of Children and Young People 12 Months after SARS-CoV-2 Testing: ... (The CLoCk Study), 2023, Pereira, Chalder et al

Sly Saint

Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Abstract:
Background: Although 99% of children and young people have been exposed to SARS-CoV-2, the long-term prevalence of post-COVID-19 symptoms in young people is unclear. The aim of this study is to describe symptom profiles 12 months after SARS-CoV-2 testing.

Method: A matched cohort study of a national sample of 20,202 children and young people who took a SARS-CoV-2 PCR test between September 2020 and March 2021.

Results: 12 months post-index-test, there was a difference in the number of symptoms reported by initial negatives who never tested positive (NN) compared to the other three groups who had at least one positive test (p < 0.001). Similarly, 10.2% of the NN group described five-plus symptoms at 12 months compared to 15.9–24.0% in the other three groups who had at least one positive test. The most common symptoms were tiredness, sleeping difficulties, shortness of breath, and headaches for all four groups. For all these symptoms, the initial test positives with subsequent reports of re-infection had higher prevalences than other positive groups (p < 0.001). Symptom profiles, mental health, well-being, fatigue, and quality of life did not vary by vaccination status.

Conclusions: Following the pandemic, many young people, particularly those that have had multiple SARS-CoV-2 positive tests, experience a range of symptoms that warrant consideration and potential investigation and intervention.

https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9067/10/7/1227
 
Following the pandemic, many young people, particularly those that have had multiple SARS-CoV-2 positive tests, experience a range of symptoms that warrant consideration and potential investigation and intervention.
And that's exactly what the money wasted on this nonsense was supposed to do but instead they wasted it all on charlatans who can't produce anything of value. Scandalous. Happening in the Netherlands, in Australia, in Canada, handed to Cochrane of all people, the giant NIH fund. They're just wasting all of it and serving themselves.
 
It is unexpected to me that this paper has been published in a MDPI journal, given that CLoCK is a large UK government-funded study. Presumably the authors, among which are eminent academics, would not have had too hard a time getting published in a more reputable journal?
 
The children and young people in the Long COVID-19 (CLoCk) study is the largest national, matched longitudinal cohort study of children and young people in England [9].
And there's at least one typo - it's not a pre-print.

It's not that this study is completely terrible, it's just that the paper doesn't tell us much. There are substudies with smaller numbers of participants, but there's not enough granularity. The response rates raise issues. The Supplementary tables have data, but I struggled to find meaty stuff. There's no mention of PEM, there's no estimate of the number of children not able to attend school due to health issues.

I assume that there will be many more papers, presumably some will expand on this finding:
Moreover, 20.4% of NN and 26.6% of PN met the research definition of the PCC 12-month post-index test (excluding the criteria of a positive test for the former). Children and young people meeting this definition, irrespective of initial test status, had higher scores (i.e., had more problems) on the SDQ with respect to total difficulties (i.e., emotional, conduct, hyperactivity, and peer relationship problems). Again, irrespective of initial test status, children and young people meeting the research definition of PCC had more adverse measures of well-being, fatigue, self-rated health, symptom severity, and impact (each item was analyzed separately, see Supplementary Table S3).
 
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The purpose of a study, could it be to keep the method and infrastructure intact.
From Sarah Boothby on X
New paediatric pathway guidance published where are the new NICE guidelines
The king is dead long live the king



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