Kids are back in town: the return of high demand for paediatric emergency care.

More than a year on from the declaration of the SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 pandemic by the WHO, the disease has now resulted in more than 175 million cases worldwide and had a huge indirect impact on much of the global population. While children and young people (CYP) have been relatively spared the direct disease burden of COVID-19, they have been particularly badly affected by indirect effects such as closures of schools and early years settings (see Marmot et al 1 for overview). In April 2020, we were among the first globally to report the observation of markedly decreased attendances to emergency departments (EDs) among CYP during the first wave of the pandemic.2 Since the UK’s initial pandemic lockdown was enacted on 23 March 2020, the UK has spent more than a year under various local, regional, …