Pediatric Pneumococcal Disease During the COVID-19 Era

Nonpharmacologic measures to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic have elicited dramatic declines in respiratory viral infections and invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD). To test the hypothesis that the decrease in IPD incidence is due to lower rates of respiratory viral infection and not pneumococcal carriage, investigators in Israel analyzed data from established cohorts of children younger than 5 years. They assessed IPD, community-acquired alveolar pneumonia, nonalveolar lower respiratory infections, nasopharyngeal pneumococcal carriage, and detection of respiratory viruses in hospitalized children during the pandemic (2020–2021) and before (2016–2019).

Compared with prepandemic levels, incidence was lower for IPD (incidence rate ratio [IRR], …