Coronavirus.
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Guidance List:
Families
Children need factual, age appropriate information about the potential seriousness of COVID-19, and concrete instruction about how to avoid its spread. Teaching children positive preventive measures, talking with them about their fears, and giving them a sense of some control over their risk can help reduce anxiety.
Parents and Guardians should:
• Remain calm. If a parent seems overly worried, a child’s anxiety may rise.
• Provide reassurance. Health and school officials are working hard to ensure that people throughout the country stay healthy. Children are not high-risk and the majority of people with COVID-19 experience mild symptoms and recover.
• Keep information simple and straightforward. Pittsburgh family physician and parenting expert Dr. Deborah Gilboa suggests asking the child what he/she has heard and believes.
• Find opportunities to correct misinformation. It’s okay if you don’t know all the answers. Information is constantly changing. Please keep the dialogue with your child open.
• Reinforce that not one group is to blame. No group should be stereotyped as responsible for the virus, and bullying or racial discrimination is. This virus can affect anybody.
At-risk Individuals
If you are at higher risk for serious illness from COVID-19 because of your age or because you have a serious long-term health problem, it is highly advisable that you make whatever changes necessary to reduce the risk of getting sick.
- Take everyday precautions to keep space between yourself and others.
- When you go out in public, keep away from others who are sick.
- Limit close contact and wash your hands often.
- Avoid crowds as much as possible.
- Avoid cruise travel and non-essential air travel.
- Stay home as much as possible to further reduce your risk of being exposed.