WASHINGTON — Texas children were hospitalized with COVID-19 at the highest rate in at least a year during the first week of August as the delta variant tore through the state.
With back-to-school season beginning, the week ending Aug. 10 saw an average of 40 children newly hospitalized per day — a 25-percent leap from the week before, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It marked the state’s highest hospital admissions rate for children in a year.
The spike in youth hospitalizations in Texas, which have climbed rapidly since mid-July, comes as the White House, local leaders and political groups are ramping up pressure on Gov. Greg Abbott to drop his ban on mask mandates, especially in schools.
It’s part of a national increase in child hospitalizations that the CDC says is driven by states with lower-than-average vaccination rates. Florida had even more pediatric COVID patients than Texas, with an average of 54 children admitted.
But the number of pediatric hospitalizations for both Texas and Florida is far higher than in other large states including California, with an average of 18 daily child hospitalizations, and New York, which is averaging six.
“I think that people should understand, seeing little kids — I mean, four, five, six years old — in hospitals, on ventilators, and some of them passing — not many, but some of them passing — it’s almost, I mean, it’s just — well, I should not characterize beyond that,” President Joe Biden said this week.
Biden administration officials are looking into whether the president has the power to intervene in Texas as local leaders in the state’s biggest counties begin to flout Abbott’s rules. That could include action from the U.S. Department of Education, though it’s unclear what that might be.
The White House continues to apply pressure, saying on Thursday that Texas and Florida accounted for nearly 40 percent of all new COVID hospitalizations in the nation over the last week.
The Republican political group the Lincoln Project put out an attack ad targeting Abbott and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. It depicts a child on a ventilator in a hospital bed and asks “If you could prevent this, wouldn’t you? Wouldn’t anyone?”
“I think this is a central question that Abbott and his team are wrestling with right now,” said Joshua Blank, a political scientist at the University of Texas at Austin. “Bringing children into the conversation changes the calculus in people’s minds.
“It’s hard to be in the position of elevating a generic principle, in one’s freedom not to wear a mask, against the health, safety, and welfare of children, who themselves are required to attend school — already under widely accepted and strict vaccination requirements and dress codes.”
If Abbott is conflicted about his stand, he hasn’t shown it. On Wednesday night, the governor threatened to sue “any school district, public university, or local government” that defies his order by requiring face coverings.
“The path forward relies on personal responsibility — not government mandates,” Abbott tweeted.
A spokeswoman for Abbott pointed to increasing vaccination rates in the state and said that school districts can use safety precautions they put in place last year, “such as creating learning pods and providing enhanced hygiene efforts for school buildings, staff, and students.”
“Texans have learned and mastered over the past year the safe practices to protect themselves and their loved ones from COVID, and do not need the government to tell them how to do so,” Renae Eze said. “Every Texan has a right to choose for themselves and their children whether they will wear masks, open their businesses, or get vaccinated.”
But health experts are increasingly concerned about the way the delta variant appears to be sending more children to hospitals. Only children 12 and up are eligible for vaccines, meaning when school starts thousands of unvaccinated children will be huddled together in classrooms, some without masks.
Meanwhile, hospitals are also seeing an uptick in RSV, which can be life-threatening for babies and young children. The respiratory infection is usually at its highest rates during the winter, but it has had a rampant off-season run this summer.
“All of this is the warmup act,” Peter Hotez, who co-directs the Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development and is dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, told the Houston Chronicle. “We’re going to pay the price for not being better advocates for vaccinations and wearing masks.”
Anthony Fauci, the federal government’s top infectious disease expert, said on Thursday there is “no doubt that there are more children getting infected.”
He said it “could possibly be the case” that the delta variant is more severe in children than previous COVID variants — as some studies have suggested is the case for adults — “but we are not seeing this in a definitive way.”
“The only thing we know for sure is that more infections mean more children will be in the hospital,” Fauci said.
Later in the day in an interview with NPR, Fauci added that he would be “very concerned” about sending children to a school where teachers and students aren’t wearing masks and suggested parents should pressure politicians to rethink policies preventing them.
“We’re dealing with the safety of the children, not any theoretical, libertarian thought about telling people what they can do or not to do,” Fauci said. “The safety of the children comes first.”
Abbott, who is heading into a primary and entertaining a 2024 run for president, isn’t out of step with many members of his party.
Polling has shown masks remain a partisan issue. A University of Texas at Austin poll in June found 67 percent of Republicans said they did not wear a mask when in close contact with people outside of their household. Eighty six percent of Democrats said they did.
Matt Rinaldi, the chairman of the state GOP, was threatening to pull his 3-year-old child out of school after Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins issued an order requiring masks in Dallas County schools, businesses and county buildings.
“Forcibly masking toddlers is child abuse,” Rinaldi tweeted.
Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton moved to challenge the mandate within hours.
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story misstated how many Texas children are currently hospitalized for COVID-19.
