Ex-CDC head Tom Frieden says kids may be secret coronavirus carriers

The ex-director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Monday that the deadly coronavirus may be “impossible” to contain — and that kids may be secret carriers of the disease.

“We think it will be very difficult if not impossible to contain it … but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try,” Dr. Tom Frieden told reporters.


Frieden pointed to evidence that people with mild or no symptoms, including children, may be secret carriers of the virus.

He cited a report of a 10-year-old boy who visited the outbreak’s epicenter in China and didn’t show any symptoms of the virus. But when the boy’s parents insisted doctors test him, he was diagnosed with the virus, according to the Lancet medical journal.

“The fact that children may get infected but not show symptoms poses a risk to pediatricians,” Frieden said.

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