# If the reason day care or kindergarten children get sick a lot is because their immune system is sti **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 23, 2019, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415 "2019-03-23T15:53:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/21 "2019-03-25T16:40:21Z")
People who work with children, including myself, seem to accept that the first 2 years or so will result in a higher rate of sickness. After which time things return to normal, and that has been my experience. However the children seem to be getting sick each year. So to me there is a difference. Also not every sickness kanickid brings home do we catch. ---
**Author:** ![swampspruce](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/swampspruce/32/261_2.png) [@swampspruce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampspruce)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/22 "2019-03-25T17:58:23Z")
SMWBO is a teacher and she works with the filthy little disease vectors.A new school year brings a new cold for us to try out despite all her precautions. Additionally, she has to guard against yearly attacks of lice, pink eye and now, possibly bedbugs. It makes me want to start scratching just thinking about it. Anecdotally, I’ve read that having many small colds/flus etc. is better than only rarely getting sick but with more intensity but I can’t remember where I saw it. Of note, Christopher Thomas Knight (The North Pond Hermit), apparently never had a cold the whole time he lived away from the seething mass of humanity so despite what Mom said, your associates are the problem not the weather… ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/23 "2019-03-25T18:56:36Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Producing 160 vaccines would be spectacularly expensive and time consuming. You could probably combine some in a single shot, but you would still probably have to have a lot of injections. An occasional cold is a bother, not normally life-threatening, so it isn’t worth it. I would estimate that getting a cold costs me easily a day’s lost productivity. I often stay home from work to avoid infecting others, I don’t sleep well. I often _do_ infect others, including my children, who then can’t go to preschool, requiring that I or my wife stay home from work. With a toddler in the house, I get multiple colds a year. How much does a vaccine cost? At minimum wage, a day off work costs $88. I make a lot more than minimum wage. I would gladly pay $10000 and get dozens of injections to never get a cold again. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/24 "2019-03-25T19:23:45Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > I would estimate that getting a cold costs me easily a day’s lost productivity. I often stay home from work to avoid infecting others, I don’t sleep well. I often _do_ infect others, including my children, who then can’t go to preschool, requiring that I or my wife stay home from work. > > With a toddler in the house, I get multiple colds a year. > > How much does a vaccine cost? From [here](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1551949/) > [@](#): > > It often takes more than 10 years to deliver a final, licensed vaccine,5 and requires not only excellence during research and product development but also managerial and funding commitment throughout the endeavor. The cost of developing a vaccine—from research and discovery to product registration—is estimated to be between US $200 million and US $500 million per vaccine. Now there may be economies in developing vaccines to similar viruses at the same time, but even the low per vaccine estimate means $32 billion to develop a vaccine effective against 160 rhinoviruses. And that’s just to develop and test the vaccine. It says nothing about production costs. > [@](#): > > At minimum wage, a day off work costs $88. I make a lot more than minimum wage. I would gladly pay $10000 and get dozens of injections to never get a cold again. I suspect you are in a small minority. In a job in which you are allowed paid sick days, a day off costs you nothing. And people who are making minimum wage and don’t get sick days don’t have a spare $10,000 sitting around - and would prefer to just stay home anyway. In any case, rhinoviruses are only the most common viruses that produce the symptoms we call the common cold. There are also coronaviruses, adenoviruses, other enteroviruses, and others. In all, there are more than 200 viruses involved. Regardless of what your personal preference might be, the answer to why a vaccine hasn’t been developed yet is basically cost vs benefit. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/25 "2019-03-25T20:36:31Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > I would estimate that getting a cold costs me easily a day’s lost productivity. I often stay home from work to avoid infecting others, I don’t sleep well. I often _do_ infect others, including my children, who then can’t go to preschool, requiring that I or my wife stay home from work. > > With a toddler in the house, I get multiple colds a year. > > How much does a vaccine cost? > > At minimum wage, a day off work costs $88. I make a lot more than minimum wage. I would gladly pay $10000 and get dozens of injections to never get a cold again. I don’t think most people stay home from work or keeps their kids home from school for every cold. Are you perhaps defining “cold” differently than I am? Runny nose, sneezing, maybe a cough , but no fever? ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/26 "2019-03-25T21:13:04Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > I suspect you are in a small minority. In a job in which you are allowed paid sick days, a day off costs you nothing. And people who are making minimum wage and don’t get sick days don’t have a spare $10,000 sitting around - and would prefer to just stay home anyway. I have paid sick days, but the fact that getting a cold doesn’t have a direct monetary cost _to me_ doesn’t mean the cost goes away. It is borne in some way by me and my employer (and in some ways by society as a whole, if we assume that I’m doing some societally useful work, an assumption I like to make), just not quite as transparently as if I didn’t get paid when I stayed home. My employer already pays for someone to come out and give us all flu vaccines every year, so they seem to agree with me in general. Estimates of lost productivity due to the common cold are [$25 billion annually](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12227674) in the US alone. So it sounds like that vaccine program pays for itself in a year and a half. If we go up to 200 vaccines, that makes the break even point about 2 years. Yes, there are per-person production and administration costs, but back of the envelope suggests that this is not a crazy plan. Also, you don’t actually have to vaccinate for every strain. Obviously, it’d be nice to never have a cold, but start with the most common and you’re still getting real gains. Also (to toot my own horn a bit) looks like I totally nailed it on my “about one day of lost productivity” wild-ass guess. > [@linked study abstract](#): > > Each cold experienced by a working adult caused an average of 8.7 lost work hours (2.8 absenteeism hours; 5.9 hours of on-the-job loss), and 1.2 work hours were lost because of attending to children under the age of 13 who were suffering from colds. > [@doreen](#): > > I don’t think most people stay home from work or keeps their kids home from school for every cold. Are you perhaps defining “cold” differently than I am? Runny nose, sneezing, maybe a cough , but no fever? A lot of people don’t. But they probably should. Also, kids can often get a fever from a cold. Our preschool does not allow children with visible signs of infection, which means a cold often means several days at home for the kids. My impression is that a lot of people will stay home from work for the worst day or two of a cold. Probably varies a lot based on type of work and personal preference and economic situation. Either way, a good estimate for actual costs incorporates what people actually do. And the costs of the common cold are vast. A vaccine would not be a financial misstep. And of course we’re only talking about the economic costs. Having a cold sucks. If you get 2 or 3 colds a year (that’s about my average I think) and they last a bit over a week that’s like 5% of your life that you spend feeling kinda crappy. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/27 "2019-03-25T22:25:29Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > And people who are making minimum wage and don’t get sick days don’t have a spare $10,000 sitting around - and would prefer to just stay home anyway. They may prefer to stay home, but most minimum wagers just go to work with colds because they can’t afford to lose a day’s pay. Their boss may not appreciate them spreading germs around, especially if they’re food workers, but if he didn’t want them to do that, then he needs to give them paid sick time. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2019, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/28 "2019-03-25T22:46:16Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > A lot of people don’t. But they probably should. Also, kids can often get a fever from a cold. Our preschool does not allow children with visible signs of infection, which means a cold often means several days at home for the kids. My impression is that a lot of people will stay home from work for the worst day or two of a cold. Probably varies a lot based on type of work and personal preference and economic situation. My kid’s preschool ( and school and afterschool care) didn’t allow children with fevers, nausea/vomiting ,diarrhea or pinkeye. Does your kids preschool actually bar kids with runny noses and coughs - or do just mean your kids often get fevers with colds ?( Mine didn’t. If they had a fever it was an ear infection, strep throat or possibly bronchitis - but not a cold) ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2019, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/29 "2019-03-26T03:39:38Z")
> [@doreen](#): > > My kid’s preschool ( and school and afterschool care) didn’t allow children with fevers, nausea/vomiting ,diarrhea or pinkeye. Does your kids preschool actually bar kids with runny noses and coughs - or do just mean your kids often get fevers with colds ?( Mine didn’t. If they had a fever it was an ear infection, strep throat or possibly bronchitis - but not a cold) Technically, yes, the preschool does not allow kids with runny noses and coughs. Now, if the kid is clearly past the worst and there’s a minor lingering symptom, then they’re not going to be jerks about it. But, yeah, they’ll send the kid home if he clearly has a full-on cold. I would say my son has gotten a mild fever (~100F) with about half the illnesses that I would consider colds. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2019, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415/30 "2019-03-27T03:28:34Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > The main diseases involved are rhinoviruses (“the common cold”), and influenza. We don’t acquire general immunity to them because there are many varieties of rhinovirus, and having one doesn’t protect from the others, and influenza mutates so often that having a previous version doesn’t protect from new ones. > > As said, school age kids get sick a lot because (1) they are in close contact with a lot of other kids, (2) they have behaviors that promote contagion, (3) they haven’t yet been exposed to most of the rhinoviruses. Their parents have already been exposed to many rhinoviruses, so they will pick up more than non-parents, but won’t pick up everything their kids get. Bit of a hijack question: are humans immune to every rhinovirus they have ever been exposed to? If I get a cold from rhinovirus XB1 (made up name) am I now immune to it? So if XB1 is the big “bug going around” I cannot catch it? Do these individual varieties die out after a week or two? After 1 season? After 2 or 3? Never? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-the-reason-day-care-or-kindergarten-children-get-sick-a-lot-is-because-their-immune-system-is-sti/831415.md?page=1)