Gold Coast Health's Director of Paediatrics Susan Moloney advises that most children with COVID-19 can be adequately managed by their GP.

When treating children with COVID-19, please consider:

• Children with COVID-19 have an acute illness and the vast majority do very well with simple measures. It is rare for them to require oxygen. Most should stay with GP managed care.
• Simple measures such as frequent oral fluids, paracetamol and ibuprofen are recommended.
• COVID-19 croup should be treated with steroids.
• Only those over 12 years or 40 kg who are not vaccinated and have a limited number of chronic diseases are eligible for sotrovimab, most of these are known to a speciality team and will be informed by the family.
• If a child has a Gold Coast Health nurse navigator for their complex disease, you should email the navigator and clinical team so they are aware of the diagnosis and they can escalate care if further care is required. This particularly applies to oncology and post-transplant children.
• All infants under 3 months with a fever should be referred to the Emergency Department for investigation and treatment for neonatal sepsis.
• If you have concerns about any children under your care, please refer them to the Emergency Department.

In addition, GPs are advised to be alert to the possibility of Paediatric Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome Temporally Associated with COVID-19 (PIMS-TS), also called “multisystem inflammatory syndrome” in children (MIS-C). This can be expected at 2-8 weeks post-COVID infection. Children do not need to have had significant COVID illness to get this response. It is more common in the unvaccinated however Omicron is causing a higher case rate.

Further advice can be found in the QCH guideline and online .