Nursery World - A & E departments report dramatic rise in young children with fever

Hospital emergency departments have seen a surge in the number of young children being brought in with mild fever by anxious parents - three times the number for June last year.

Young children are being exposed to respiratory infections, as social distancing eases and they come into contact with more children, leading to an increase in admissions to hospital emergency departments PHOTO Adobe Stock

Doctors say the increase is due to young children coming into contact with other children, as social distancing eases, and new parents seeking advice because the usual support services have not been available to them during the pandemic.

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) has heard from paediatric emergency medicine doctors around the country describing pressures on their emergency department (ED) due to the increase, with one paediatrician describing the incident as ‘like winter in June’.

However, cases among under-fives are usually relatively mild. The RCPH attributes the rise among parents bringing their young children into A & E to the fact that many parents have not seen fever in their child before – particularly if they were born during lockdown, and are consequently taking them to hospital rather than seeking help at pharmacies, their GP, NHS 111 or online.

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