Evidence map›Paper›PMID 33342635›Full record

SynthesisVaccine2021

Epidemiology of COVID-19 infection in young children under five years: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Mejbah Uddin Bhuiyan, Eunice Stiboy, Md Zakiul Hassan, Mei Chan, Md Saiful Islam, Najmul Haider, Adam Jaffe, Nusrat Homaira

Open access · greenAbstract readMeta-AnalysisSystematic Review
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Synthesis in Vaccine, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 101 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
101citing papers in PubMed, 6 pooled it
15.9field-weighted citation impact, top 1% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

101 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 201 citations in OpenAlex.

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  12. Autism in Preschool-Aged Children: The Effects of COVID-19 Lockdown.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2024
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41 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

8 authors at 5 institutions in 3 countries.

Mejbah Uddin BhuiyanWesfarmers Centre of Vaccines and Infectious Diseases, Telethon Kids Institute, Western Australia, Australia. Electronic address: Mejbah.Bhuiyan@telethonkids.org.au.
Eunice StiboySchool of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health, The University of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Md Zakiul HassanProgram for Emerging Infections, Infectious Diseases Division, icddr,b, Bangladesh.
Mei ChanSchool of Women's and Children's Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Md Saiful IslamProgram for Emerging Infections, Infectious Diseases Division, icddr,b, Bangladesh; School of Public Health and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Najmul HaiderThe Royal Veterinary College, University of London, Hatfield, Hertfordshire, AL9 7TA, UK.
Adam JaffeSchool of Women's and Children's Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia; Respiratory Department, Sydney Children's Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Nusrat HomairaSchool of Women's and Children's Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia; Respiratory Department, Sydney Children's Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
UNSW Sydney · AUInternational Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research · BDThe Kids Research Institute Australia · AUThe University of Sydney · AUUniversity of London · GB

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

introductionEmerging evidence suggests young children are at greater risk of COVID-19 infection than initially predicted. However, a comprehensive understanding of epidemiology of COVID-19 infection in young children under five years, the most at-risk age-group for respiratory infections, remain unclear. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis of epidemiological and clinical characteristics of COVID-19 infection in children under five years.

methodFollowing the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses , we searched several electronic databases (Pubmed, EMBASE, Web of Science, and Scopus) with no language restriction for published epidemiological studies and case-reports reporting laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 infection in children under five years until June 4, 2020. We assessed pooled prevalence for key demographics and clinical characteristics using Freeman-Tukey double arcsine random-effects model for studies except case-reports. We evaluated risk of bias separately for case-reports and other studies.

resultsWe identified 1,964 articles, of which, 65 articles were eligible for systematic review that represented 1,214 children younger than five years with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 infection. The pooled estimates showed that 50% young COVID-19 cases were infants (95% CI: 36% - 63%, 27 studies); 53% were male (95% CI: 41% - 65%, 24 studies); 43% were asymptomatic (95% CI: 15% - 73%, 9 studies) and 7% (95% CI: 0% - 30%, 5 studies) had severe disease that required intensive-care-unit admission. Of 139 newborns from COVID-19 infected mothers, five (3.6%) were COVID-19 positive. There was only one death recorded. DISCUSSION: This systematic review reports the largest number of children younger than five years with COVID-19 infection till date. Our meta-analysis shows nearly half of young COVID-19 cases were asymptomatic and half were infants, highlighting the need for ongoing surveillance to better understand the epidemiology, clinical pattern, and transmission of COVID-19 to develop effective preventive strategies against COVID-19 disease in young paediatric population.

Indexed as

AdultAsymptomatic DiseasesChild, PreschoolCOVID-19Epidemiological MonitoringFemaleHumansIncidenceInfantInfant, NewbornInfectious Disease Transmission, VerticalIntensive Care UnitsMaleMothersPublication BiasSARS-CoV-2Children younger than five yearsCOVID-19COVID-19 newborns

Identifiers

PMID33342635
PMCPMC7833125
OpenAlexW3110893147

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.