FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – October 18, 2021
Media Contact: Logan Anderson, PIO,
logan.anderson@vdh.virginia.gov
Virginia Department of Health Adds COVID-19 Data Dashboard for Cases
Among Children
Figures Will Show Hospitalizations And Deaths
(Richmond, Va.) —Today, the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) announced it has added a COVID-19 in Virginia: Cases Among Children dashboard to display COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths for children aged 0 to 17 years. The dashboard is being added because of the increase in COVID-19 cases among children across the state since the end of the summer. Since March 2020, VDH reports that there have been 127,997 COVID-19 cases among children 0 to 17 years, 380 hospitalizations and nine deaths.
VDH will report case counts, rate and the percentage of all cases among children by week and by pediatric age group for children under 18 years of age. The dashboard will display data by region and health district and will contain four age groups: 0-4, 5-11, 12-15, and 16-17 years. The VDH regions are Central, Eastern, Southwest, Northern and Northwest.
COVID-19 infections in children have increased along with the spread of the Delta variant. While children under 12 years are not yet eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, VDH recommends that everyone 12 years and older be fully vaccinated to help protect against COVID-19. Widespread vaccination of eligible Virginians can protect all children, especially those who are still too young to be vaccinated.
The dashboard will be updated weekly on Fridays to include new data and communications. There can be delays in public-facing information of real-time COVID-19 data as VDH completes COVID-19 case investigations and performs data quality and reporting steps.