What we know about China’s new pneumonia outbreak so far

 News of an outbreak of a strange “white lung” pneumonia hospitalizing kids in northern China is more than enough to start the rest of us worrying.

That fear is well-warranted, given China’s long and continuing history of hiding public-health realities from the rest of the world.

Especially now that similar illnesses — with as yet unknown causes — have broken out on US soil in Ohio.

So far (thankfully) there’s no direct evidence of a new pathogen or a lab leak here; if anything, in fact, just the opposite.

Yet the fear alone — recalling the time in early 2020 when China was denying the scope of a new outbreak and the World Health Organization was backing this false reality — is certainly justified and terrifying.

We simply can’t trust any public-health info coming out of China.

We couldn’t trust their public health pronouncements back then, and we can’t trust them now.

The vision of an international consortium of scientists (including China) informing the world in real time that Tony Fauci and others envisioned two decades ago has never succeeded.

So what is happening now? If not another new killer virus, then what?

For one thing, it’s respiratory infection season in northern China and in the northern hemisphere around the world, and there are multiple pathogens circulating including, RSV, influenza, adenoviruses, strep and COVID.

The lockdowns that were reinstituted in China in 2022, and lasted until late in the year, have led to millions of people encountering these bugs for the first time in a few years, or in the case of infants, for the first time ever.

This may well have caused a delayed immune response (immune pause), as it takes the immune system longer to recognize something it hasn’t seen in a while, or never seen, and more severe illness results.

But the main problem causing the increase in childhood hospitalizations in China, Denmark and the Netherlands (where lockdowns also lasted into 2022) appears to be a tiny bacteria known as mycoplasma.

The mycoplasma problem is worsened because of a growing antibiotic resistance due to overuse of the antibiotic azithromycin (Zpack).

Whereas this common infection in the late fall is usually mild and treatable with antibiotics, the resistant form is more likely to cause severe illness, including “walking pneumonia.”

In Denmark, 541 cases were reported last week alone, and many more were missed. 

Here in the United States, we are just starting to see the problem emerge.

Warren County, Ohio, reported 142 cases of childhood pneumonia last week, and the state has yet to determine if the cause is mycoplasma or a combination of pathogens — though I wouldn’t be surprised if it is mycoplasma.

Indeed, mycoplasma may well be coming to a state near you, and though there are other antibiotics regularly used to treat it, including tetracyclines and fluoroquinolones, they are not used widely in children for fear of side effects.

Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have continued to up their game in terms of tracking respiratory infections.

Thanks to CDC, we know that our flu season is still early with only 12,000 hospitalizations nationwide, and while the agency estimates that RSV (which is peaking now) leads to 58,000 to 80,000 hospitalizations a year, it too is not likely the main cause of the pneumonia hospitalizations in China or Europe, which are occurring in older children.

Unfortunately, I am not as confident in worldwide surveillance and transparency, nor should anyone be.

And even if the current surge of childhood pneumonias is due to the well-known bacteria mycoplasma and the longtime overuse of old antibiotics, it by no means indicates the next mysterious pneumonia won’t be from a leaky lab in China where risky research continues.

Fear and distrust remain warranted.

Marc Siegel, MD, is a clinical professor of medicine and medical director of Doctor Radio at NYU Langone Health and a Fox News medical analyst.

https://nypost.com/2023/12/01/opinion/what-we-know-about-chinas-new-pneumonia-outbreak-so-far/