Children and COVID-19: State-Level Data Report

State-level reports are the best publicly available and timely data on child COVID-19 cases in the United States. The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association are collaborating to collect and share all publicly available data from states on child COVID-19 cases. The definition of “child” case is based on varying age ranges reported across states (see report Appendix for details and links to all data sources).

As of March 23, over 15.5 million children are reported to have tested positive for COVID-19 since the onset of the pandemic according to available state reports. Over 66,000 of these cases have been added in the past 4 weeks. This week over 13,000 child COVID-19 cases were reported. Over the past 6 months, weekly reported child cases have plateaued at an average of about 30,000 cases.

The age distribution of reported COVID-19 cases was provided on the health department websites of reporting states, New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Guam. Since the pandemic began, children represented 18.0% of total cumulated cases.

For the current week ending March 23, the portion of reported cases that were children was 12.8% (children, under age 18, make up 22.2% of the US population). Reported cases are likely a substantial undercount of COVID-19 cases among children. In addition, several states have reduced the frequency of reporting and updating cases. See full report for additional data.

There is a need to collect more age-specific data to assess the severity of illness as well as potential longer-term effects among children. It is important to recognize there are immediate effects of the pandemic on children’s health, but importantly we need to identify and address the long-lasting impacts on the physical, mental, and social well-being of this generation of children and youth.

Summary of Findings (data available as of 3/23/23) :

Cumulative Number of Child COVID-19 Cases*

15,523,320 total child COVID-19 cases reported, and children represented 18.0% (15,523,320/86,352,691) of all cases
Overall rate: 20,624 cases per 100,000 children in the population

Change in Child COVID-19 Cases*

13,181 child COVID-19 cases were reported the past week from 3/16/23-3/23/23 (15,510,140 to 15,523,320) and children represented 12.8% (13,181/102,937) of the weekly reported cases

See detail in Appendix: Data from 49 states, NYC, DC, PR, and GU; Analysis by American Academy of Pediatrics and Children’s Hospital Association

*Note: Data Limitations. The numbers in this report represent cumulative counts since states began reporting. The data are based on how public agencies collect, categorize and post information. All data reported by state/local health departments are preliminary and subject to change and reporting may change over time.

See detail in State-Level Changes: For several states (AL, DC, HI, KY, MN. MS, NE, SC, TX, & VA), due to available data and changes made to dashboards, cumulative child cases and total cases for all ages are not current. Readers should consider these, factors. States may have additional information on their web sites.

Changes in testing, changes in how states report, periods when school is not in session and holiday weeks affect week to week comparisons and might cause irregularities in reporting and trends. Shortages of COVID-19 tests during surges and COVID-19 home tests likely affect the undercounting of COVID-19 cases.

As of 6/16/22, due to only a portion of states reporting hospitalizations and deaths, we are no longer providing updates on cumulative hospitalizations and mortality data. The CDC now provides information that includes all of the US: For information regarding US child hospitalizations from the CDC, visit https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#new-hospital-admissions. For information pertaining to US child morality from the CDC, visit https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#demographics.

As of 3/2/23, the Children and COVID-19 Report was simplified and charts were modified for better readability.

Download Full Report (3/23/2023)

Download Full Report (3/16/2023)

Download Full Report (3/9/2023)