National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins was forced to backtrack after saying parents should wear masks at home if they have unvaccinated children.
“Let me clarify the masking message that I garbled on this morning [at CNN],” Collins wrote in a tweet Tuesday afternoon. “Vaccinated parents who live in communities with high COVID transmission rates should mask when out in public indoor settings to minimize risks to their unvaccinated kids. No need to mask at home.”
Earlier in the day, in an interview on CNN, Collins advocated mask-wearing at home, saying, “Parents of unvaccinated kids should be thoughtful about this, and the recommendation is to wear masks there as well. I know that’s uncomfortable. I know it seems weird, but it is the best way to protect your kids.”
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommend children wear masks indoors in public settings or with people who do not live with them, but not when home with their parents.
Collins made the recommendation as cases of COVID-19 rise among children under age 12.
On Tuesday, Beau Tidwell, communications director for New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell, warned that the delta variant was worsening the situation for children.
“This is killing children,” Tidwell said. “Children 12 years and younger and some children less than a year old are having serious complications from this and are being hospitalized. Children are making up more than 2,000 of the new COVID-19 cases in Louisiana.”
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According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, there were 72,000 cases of COVID-19 among children during the final week of July, up from 39,000 the previous week. Children have accounted for about 14% of total cases during the pandemic but 19% in the final week of July.
Still, deaths from COVID-19 remain extremely rare among children. Only three deaths among children under 18 were reported in June, according to the CDC, with another three in July.
