A seven-year-old boy with no underlying health conditions has died from the coronavirus in Georgia, as President Donald Trump is boasting that children are “almost immune” from COVID-19. The boy became the youngest victim of the virus in Georgia.
Like many other southern states, Georgia has suffered from a surge in coronavirus cases over the past two months. There have now been more than 200,000 cases in the state and over 4,000 deaths.
In a statement, Health Director Dr. Lawton Davis said, “Every COVID-19 death we report is tragic, but to lose someone so young is especially heart-breaking,” per CNN.
Davis added, “We know that older individuals and those with underlying conditions are at higher risk of complications, but this is a disease everyone should take seriously.”
Trump has been pushing hard for schools to re-open and on Wednesday he told Fox News, “It doesn’t have an impact on them and I have watched some doctors say they’re totally immune. The fact is that they are virtually immune from this problem and we have to open our schools.”
Trump repeated the claim that children are “virtually immune” to the disease a day earlier during an interview with Fox Business, saying, “Young people, they have better immune systems than we do — I hate to tell you this — and they are in very good shape. Virtually, virtually immune from this disease.”
WATCH: Trump continues to downplay the risk of fully reopening schools without a plan to do it safely by lying that children are "virtually immune" to the coronavirus. pic.twitter.com/dTgpze3kH7
— DNC War Room (@DNCWarRoom) August 4, 2020
Some schools have re-opened in Georgia and one teen was suspended after she posted on social media a photo of a crowded hallway in one of the state’s schools. But the suspension has since been lifted.
The 7-year-old in Georgia is not the first child in the South to die from the coronavirus. In late July, a 9-year-old girl in Florida died, her family said that she had no underlying health conditions.