Jessica Rosario loved watching her 15-year-old, Eliana, play flute with the rest of the marching band during Open Door Christian School football games. But after the homecoming game in 2021, she got an alarming call from the Ohio school’s band director.
Rosario’s daughter was on the floor of the band room, clutching her chest.
“We ran up to the school, went into the band room, and I found her laying on the floor with her legs elevated on a chair, and I’m looking at her, and she’s not really moving,” Rosario said.
The freshman couldn’t speak or stand. When paramedics transported her to the ambulance, she was dead weight, her mom says.
Eliana’s condition turned out to be an extreme form of long Covid. She’s one of potentially millions of US children who have symptoms long after their initial infection.
Children – even healthy teens and the very young – can have long Covid, several studies have found, and it can follow an infection that’s severe or mild.