The World Health Organization (WHO) does not rule out the possibility that acute hepatitis among young children is partly transmissible. This may be the case in some of the cases, according to the organization. The Netherlands and Scotland have received reports of acute liver failure cases in which children had contact with each other. Other theories include the adenovirus, to which children now react more violently, an immune response to a corona infection, or a combination of the two. This reports the Telegraaf.
Acute hepatitis without an obvious cause has been diagnosed five times in the Netherlands. Three children had to undergo a liver transplant. Two others also became seriously ill, but did not require a new liver. Worldwide, approximately 650 unexplained cases of this severe form of hepatitis have been reported. At least one child has died as a result.
Contact with others
In one of the five children in the Netherlands, a classmate had jaundice. That child recovered spontaneously and did not develop acute liver failure. The other four children are not known to have had contact with anyone who may have had liver disease or also acute hepatitis.
Individual response of the body
Henk-Jan Verkade, professor of pediatrics and liver doctor at the UMCG, states that the transferability of hepatitis does not explain everything. “The term contagiousness is therefore too strong. That would immediately fully explain the cause of liver failure. That is not the case,” he says. Even if a child were exposed to it, the individual reaction of the body determines what it does with it. Verkade thinks that the immune response in a group of children has changed because children have been exposed to viruses later in life as a result of the corona pandemic. According to the professor, the adenovirus is not the explanation, because only two out of five children in the Netherlands had that virus at that time.
Nearly 60 percent of reported cases worldwide come from Europe. Especially in the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland many children are affected by acute hepatitis. Out of 650 possible cases, 222 come from there. Most of the children are under 5 years old.
By: National Care Guide / Johanne Levinsky