Covid Face Masks Are Damaging to Young Children | by Richard Bruschi | ILLUMINATION | Mediumhttps://medium.com/illumination/covid-face-masks-are-damaging-to-young-children-8f72dac003d3Science says impairments in development and learning will happen
Photo by Nenad Stojkovic.
I was travelling on a train from Brighton to London last spring. A young mother had her baby on her lap, playing with her. The mother had a face mask on, as per Covid-19 government regulations.
“It’s strange for the kid to see half the faces, isn’t it?” I asked, pensive.
“She’s very young, she doesn’t know any different.” the woman replied.
My heart sank. The realization that for a generation of kids it was normal to see only half the face of people, even parents, for many hours a day, struck me. I wondered what were the consequences on kids’ development.
It is intuitive to think that if an infant can only see half a parent, teacher, or person’s face, then the assimilation of the information is impaired, causing negative consequences on learning and development of emotions, speech, and probably something else. Nevertheless, I wanted to read the scientific literature about these topics.
What I found from scientific research and studies, as well as from articles interviewing scientists researching the topics, is worrisome and disconcerting.
Newborns, babies, and toddlers should be in a facemask-free environment, to ensure their natural developmental process. Their healthy formation and development should have the right of way, as adults can protect themselves in many other ways, and don’t have this high-stakes situation.
Here is why.
APPROACH
Follow the science.
I started by checking something I was told: a clear view of the parents’ faces is essential for infants’ development. It is fundamental that they see the nuances of face movements and color change, of all the parts of the face, from different emotions, and different changes for the same emotion.
From this topic, ‘facial expressions for infants’ development’, I gradually expanded to anything directly related but detached from Covid, such as ‘faces and infants learning’, ‘facial expressions for children speech development’, and more.
Then I researched those topics but related to the current Covid-19 situation, so for example ‘parents’ facemasks impact on infants development’, ‘natal care during Covid-19’, and more.
Basically, I was looking for research regarding the importance of the full visual of the face for an infant, toddler, and kid in their development and learning, and then what happened if that visual was impaired, especially in this case by a facemask.
Scientific results show problems ahead.
Photo by educatormarcossv.
FACTS & STUDIES
The basic, intuitive principle (confirmed by science) is that from birth, children need to see full faces for proper development in learning, speech, social aspects, and more.
First of all, there is the precedent of the SARS pandemic of 2003. A study of thousands of children across China who had been exposed to the SARS pandemic of 2003 states that “results showed that the SARS pandemic was associated with delayed child development.” [1] Not a great start, then.
The WHO and UNICEF themselves discouraged the “exposure to the use of facemasks when dealing with children aged up to five years old” [2], and even for older children they warned about any possible benefits against the huge “potential damage that could include social and psychological problems, and difficulties in communication and learning.” [2]
Since the moment they are born, children focus on the face, especially of parents and especially of the mother, to gather information and learn: “During the first year after birth, infants begin to extract a large amount of information from faces” [3], and that they “observed a dramatic increase in looking toward faces across development.” [3]
This is because they learn so many things from it, such as emotions. If even for adults it is significantly harder to recognize emotions with a “standard” surgical face mask (the ubiquitous medical blue ones which cover everything from the nose to the chin and from cheek to cheek) [4], for a young child it is not going to be any better.
True enough, it is important to know that “young children take years to master this skill [of recognizing faces].” [5] and for example something as little as a “fake noses, false beards, wigs and elaborate makeup present special challenges” [5], said Kang Lee, a University of Toronto professor of applied psychology and human development.
Regarding speech, kids learn by focusing on the speaker’s mouth. Starting from about eight months old [6], a baby specifically focuses on the mouth when learning speech: it is “essential for the continuing acquisition of multisensory perceptual skills and speech production abilities in infancy” [7] also because “visible articulations that babies normally see when others are talking play a key role in their acquisition of communication skills.” [7]
Social skills would be impacted too, as of course they heavily rely on recognizing faces and interpreting emotional reactions.
FINDINGS
Unfortunately, there is no way around it: “a mask obstructing a face limits the ability of people of all ages to infer emotions expressed by facial features, but the difficulties associated with the mask’s use are significantly pronounced in children aged between 3 and 5 years old.” [8]
Something else that might happen concerns mothers with newborns, infants, and babies: “insensitive behaviours may constitute a source of stress for the infant and activate stress responses. The subsequent elevation of cortisol may negatively influence brain connectivity and growth. Mask-wearing during this sensitive period then raises questions regarding mother-infant interactions and whether this could negatively impact on brain connectivity and growth.” simply because “Specific facial features are obliterated causing the global structure of a whole face to be incomplete.” [9]
CONCLUSIONS
The studies and research are there. They clearly point at big problems ahead.
Is this damage irreversible? Hopefully not. The infants, babies, and toddlers of the highly-masked societies of 2020 and 2021 would have to, and perhaps should, be assessed again in the next few years to check the initial findings.
There is a chance there won’t be any major or lingering problem. But are you ready to bet your infant, baby, or toddler development on it? The development of millions of children? Their ability to speak properly? Their learning abilities? Their social skills? Any other life-long negative impact? It is not worth taking that chance.
They are innocent. These are the next generations. They are our future. Adults need to plan around the young children. A society that has its priorities right puts the wellbeing of children first and foremost. It does not put them at risk.
Children should be in a facemask-free environment at all times. As that might be unrealistic for some parents, they should still be aware of the issues and do as much as they can, no matter how uncomfortable (just as any other parenting responsibility), to ensure the wellbeing of their children.
After more than a year and a half, is it not about time we started paying attention to long term effects with as much focus as we do on precautionary measures? Is it not about time we start looking for better solutions for our children?
Photo by Tamer_Soliman.
CONSIDERATIONS
I imagine some of you might be thinking “But what about their own health” or “They can infect others.”
I am not advocating to not take precautions. Last year I personally was buying groceries wearing gloves, besides the mask, and cleaning what I had bought before putting it away. I still clean my hands with a hospital-grade hand-spray, which has been specifically tested for anti-Covid-19 efficacy.
Masking young children is of course wrong and harmful too, for many reasons (ethical, developmental, psychological, etc.). Even the WHO and UNICEF adise not to. [10]
The death of a child from Covid-19 is heartbreaking, and thankfully extremely rare. In the United Kingdom “Deaths in children and young people (CYP) following SARS-CoV-2 infection are rare.” [11] Between March 2020 to February 2021 “25 CYP died of SARS-CoV-2 infection” [11]. Survival rate is 99.995% (mortality rate is 0.0002%).
In the USA, from January 2020 to October 2021 deaths of 0–4 years old were 195 [12]. In Italy, 15 as of today among 0–9 years [13].
Most of these children also, and unfortunately, had preconditions, such as in England where 16 of them, or 64%, had at least one comorbidity (i.e.: preconditions). [11]
As all children must be protected, societies, governments, administrations, and people are then able to prepare in a targeted way and pinpoint preventive solutions, while ensuring that millions of other kids’ wellbeing is protected too.
Second, and simply, it is us adults who must bear the burden of our own protection. This is what spurred me to write this report: the priorities are off. Administrations, adults, and parents need to come up with better solutions for the children’s wellbeing. We alone need to deal with this uneasy situation, to ensure that millions of children will not be (too) affected. Loading this struggle onto them is selfish and lacks long-term perspective.
Lastly, it is important to go straight to the source of scientific data. In some articles I have read, journalists say that scientists state such things as ‘kids are adaptable’ and ‘we’ll find other ways’, yet neither quote numerous data or studies — and this is because there does not seem to be any. Meanwhile, they still point out how parents, teachers, and relatives need to compensate for the facemasks’ learning and developmental negative effects on kids, by using other gestures and behaviours that should help. It can not be both ways: “It’s not a problem” but also “you need to correct for losses’ ”. [14] It’s too risky and irresponsible on the society-level scale we are dealing with. Superficiality is absolutely not accepted. Either the problem is there or not. From current and latest studies and some of these scientists’ own previous statements [5][14], the problem is there. Supported by established scientific research both past and contemporary.
Sources
[1] SARS pandemic exposure impaired early childhood development: A lesson for COVID-19, Y. Fan, H. Wang, Q. Wu, X. Zhou, Y. Zhou, B. Wang, Y. Han, T. Xue, T. Zhu. 12th may 2020. MedRxiv.
[2] Facemasks impair children’s ability to read people’s emotions, E. Henderson. 10th june 2021. News Medical Life Sciences.
[3] Development of infants’ attention to faces during the first year, M. C. Frank, E. Vul, and S. P. Johnson. 27th december 2008. US National Library of Medicine (NCBI).
[4] The impact of facemasks on emotion recognition, trust attribution and re-identification, M. Marini, A. Ansani, F. Paglieri, F. Caruana & M. Viola. 10th march 2021. Scientific Report (Nature Research).
[5] How Children Learn to Recognize Faces, P. Klass. 29th october 2018. The New York Times.
[6] Infants deploy selective attention to the mouth of a talking face when learning speech, D. J. Lewkowicz and A. M. Hansen-Tift. 31th january 2012. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
[7] Masks Can Be Detrimental to Babies’ Speech and Language Development, D. J. Lewkowicz. 11th February 2021. Scientific American.
[8] Masking Emotions: Face Masks Impair How We Read Emotions, M. Gori, L. Schiatti and M. B. Amadeo. 25th may 2021. Frontiers in Psychology.
[9] The implications of face masks for babies and families during the COVID-19 pandemic: A discussion paper, J. Green, L. Staff, P. Bromley, L. Jones, and J. Petty. 29th october 2020. US National Library of Medicine (NCBI).
[10] Coronavirus disease (COVID-19): Children and masks. 21th august 2020. Word Health Organization.
[11]
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-57766717, C. Smith, D. Odd, R. Harwood, J. Ward, M. Linney, M. Clark, D. Hargreaves, S. Ladhani, E. Draper, P. Davis, S. Kenny, E. Whittaker, K. Luyt, R. Viner, L. Fraser. 7th july 2021. Research Square.
[12] Provisional COVID-19 Deaths: Focus on Ages 0–18 Years. 20th october 2021. National Center for Health Statistics, Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
[13] Coronavirus (COVID-19) deaths in Italy as of October 13, 2021, by age group, C. Stewart. 22nd october 2021. Statista.
[14] Do Masks Impede Children’s Development?, P. Klass. 14th september 2020. The New York Times.