Infants and children up to the age of four in particular are visiting their GP due to influenza and the common cold virus RS. What can you do about it?
Many Dutch people enter the last month of the year with fever, sniffling and coughing. But now babies and toddlers get the flu and the common cold virus RS very often. The RS virus is the most common cold virus in children and is now on the rise. It The RS virus is now officially an epidemicthe RIVM reported this week.
The virus mainly causes serious illness in young children who experience shortness of breath due to inflammation of the small airways or pneumonia.
How is the RS virus transmitted and how can it be prevented?
Louis Bont, professor and professor of respiratory infections at UMC Utrecht: ,,The RS virus is mainly transmitted by direct contact. Hand washing is by far the most sensible and viable way to prevent transmission of the RS virus. Washing your hands is also very effective against the transmission of viruses, although you can also get them from airborne droplets ».
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Special attention for vulnerable children and newborns
Bont recommends hand washing, especially with vulnerable children. “If you have a newborn, you can safely say: wash your hands before touching the baby. If you have vulnerable children, you will need to do this every time you touch your child. A small sample taught the professor that parents and caregivers of newborns should wash their hands ten to twenty times a day. “This is often, but still doable.”
However, according to Bont, it’s impossible to escape viruses in a daycare. “There really is snot everywhere in a daycare,” she says firmly. Would it be better to keep the little ones at home? “What you can imagine is you keep vulnerable babies at home until they’re six months old.”
There is snot everywhere in a daycare
Bont thinks, for example, of children with Down syndrome, a congenital heart defect and children born prematurely. “This is probably helpful in preventing the RS virus,” she continues. “But that only makes sense if they don’t have a brother or sister who goes to kindergarten.”
How are viruses transmitted to children?
According to Bont, viruses are transmitted more often between brothers and sisters. The professor therefore recommends cleaning the surfaces regularly, for example, the playpen and the changing table. “The virus can survive on smooth surfaces for up to six hours after leaving the body.”
In hospitals, the hygiene policy is stricter “because here there are the most vulnerable children among the most vulnerable”, he continues. “But you shouldn’t take him out. Nor should we turn our society into a gilded cage.” According to him, research also shows that RS occurs on toys. “But it’s hard to say: every day a new hug”.
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