On Monday, The Epoch Times posted an article about the effect the the restrictions implemented to control the coronavirus has had on our children.

The article reports:

The research, led by Professor Sharon Goldfield identified three broad areas of issues that need intervention: the child level, family level and at the service level.

Academically, remote learning has resulted in compromised student engagement, particularly in children already facing difficulties or belonging to families where parents have a lower level of educational attainment.

The authors wrote that “almost half of the Australian student population risks having their learning severely compromised due to COVID-19-related school closures, either because they are an early year’s student or are experiencing adversity.”

Reduced physical activity and increased screentime can also affect children’s lifestyle and physical health. In a longitudinal study conducted during the pandemic for Australia and 13 other countries, children on average had 55 more minutes of screen time per day and 81 minutes less per day for weekday outdoors activities.

At the service level, school closures due to the pandemic have affected children that needed the healthcare facilitated by the school such as free lunches and mental health care. The authors reported that “referrals to child mental health services reduced substantially, before an unprecedented rise that placed increased demand on already overstretched services.”

Amongst parents, some parents also reported the impact the pandemic has had on their mental health. A poll (pdf) conducted by the Royal Children’s Hospital had 46 percent of parents reporting that the pandemic had a negative impact on their mental health. However, the same poll also reported that 75 percent of parents felt their families were closer, and 42 percent said they are more connected to their child since the pandemic.

There have been other negative results from the masking requirements. Many people involved in education believe that children wearing masks and dealing with adults wearing masks are not able to grasp the visual ques that normally are part of their learning. A child looking at a masked adult is not really able to see a smile or an approving look. There is also the fact that children have never been a high-risk group for the coronavirus. We may have unintentionally slowed down the learning curve for the majority of American children during the past two years. Hopefully the children can quickly go back to normal learning and leave the masks behind.