Scientists are urgently investigating hints the new variant of coronavirus spreads more easily in children.
If proven, this could account for “a significant proportion” of the increase in transmission, they say.
The claim comes from members of the government’s New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats advisory group (Nervtag).
Children almost universally shrug off the virus, but the variant could alter the role they, and schools, play in spreading the virus.
Earlier strains of coronavirus found it harder to infect children than adults.
Prof Wendy Barclay, from Nervtag and Imperial College London, said the mutations to the virus appeared to be making it easier to walk through the doorways that were there.
She said this could be putting children on a “more level playing field” with adults as the virus was “less inhibited” in children.