GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – As testing for COVID-19 continues to expand across Wisconsin – and right here in Brown County – there is one demographic that the National Guard will not perform tests on. Children ages five and under.
“Can children contract the disease and spread it? Yes they can,” says Julie Willems Van Dijk of the Department of Health Services, “The pediatric tests with children with much smaller anatomy are conducted by their pediatrician.”
But starting in Brown County on Wednesday, healthcare agencies will bring in people who can test those children at community sites. Up until now, testing has focused on people more likely to have the virus.
“We’ve seen it much more in older populations, so that would be another reason not to subject the youngest children to testing in their carseat,” Willems Van Dijk says, “We are testing populations that are certainly more likely to have the disease, and we’ve seen it much more prevalently in adults. So that’s the focus of our testing.”
According to the DHS website, just two percent of confirmed cases in Wisconsin are under the age of ten.
