What if children are less likely to carry the coronavirus than previously thought? For Professor Robert Cohen, pediatrician and infectious disease specialist, the hypothesis that the youngest are frequent healthy carriers gives rise to "real doubts". "Everyone started from the idea that children are often carriers of the virus, that they do not get sick, but that they transmit it. The first data do not go in this direction," he explains. at the microphone of Europe 1.
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A vast study launched in Ile-de-France
A large study was launched on Wednesday on the subject. "It will allow us to know the rate of carriage of the virus in children at this stage of the epidemic," he points out. Hundreds of children in Ile-de-France must be screened for one month by PCR and serological tests.
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The first results should be available before the possible reopening of schools in May, sketched on Monday by the President of the Republic, and which has aroused much concern among parents of students. "I don't know if we'll be finished by then, but we will already have a lot of results."