MIAMI: Greater numbers of American children are being swept up in a wave of coronavirus infections driven by the Delta variant, causing renewed anxiety for parents and a bitter political fight as schools prepare to reopen within weeks.

Much of the surge is concentrated in the southeastern state of Florida, where some school districts are defying an order by the Republican governor forbidding mask mandates, in the latest political twist in the health crisis.

“Parents are put into an impossible situation of having to choose between the health and life of their child and returning (to) school,” said a lawsuit against the governor’s order filed by parents of children with disabilities on Friday.

The majority of children who catch the coronavirus will have a mild or asymptomatic disease, and until recently they had not been a major focal point of the pandemic.

That’s now changing with Delta, a variant that is as contagious as chickenpox and largely drove 72,000 pediatric cases in the week leading up to July 29, according to a new study by the American Academy of Pediatrics — a figure five times higher than in late June.

Nearly 20,000 of those cases were in Florida, according to state data.

The Sunshine State is also experiencing the highest number of hospitalizations for minors in the country — currently 143, which is ahead of Texas.

“We definitely have seen an increase in cases here, in our emergency department and also within the rest of the hospital, in the last two or three weeks,” Dr. Marcos Mestre, medical director of Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami, told AFP.

Only around one percent of children diagnosed with Covid-19 will be hospitalized, said Mestre, but complications are more likely for those with diabetes or who are overweight.

While studies have confirmed Delta is the most transmissible strain to date, there is uncertainty about whether it causes more severe disease.