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(MINNEAPOLIS, Minn.) — Attorneys for former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in a court filing Monday asked an appeals court to overturn his conviction in the killing of George Floyd.

Chauvin’s lawyers in the filing asked the court to do one of three things: reverse his conviction, reverse his conviction and grant him a new trial in a different venue, or return the case to a lower court for resentencing.

In April 2021, Chauvin was found guilty in the death of Floyd on counts of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.

He was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison last June.

In a 72-page court filing, Chauvin’s lawyers said that pretrial publicity, jurors’ concerns for their safety, the potential for riots to break out if Chauvin was acquitted and physical threats to the courthouse prevented Chauvin from getting a fair trial.

“The overwhelming media coverage exposed the jurors — literally every day — to news demonizing Chauvin and glorifying Floyd, which was more than sufficient to presume prejudice,” the court filing said.

The lawyers added, “However, the real problem is the jurors expressed concern for (i) they and their families’ personal safety and (ii) riots breaking out in the event they acquitted Chauvin.”

The court filing argued that a change of venue, which was previously denied by the lower court, was necessary in this case.

“There are few cases involving such violent threats by the community in the event the jury finds the defendant not guilty. Those cases — which all involved defendant police officers — required transfer of venue,” the attorneys said in the filing.

The threat of violence was “extreme,” and because jurors were not sequestered, they saw this every day during trial, Chauvin’s lawyers said in the filing.

“The courthouse was surrounded by barbed wire and soldiers during the trial. Prior to jury deliberations, National Guard troops were deployed throughout Minneapolis, businesses boarded up their buildings and schools were closed ‘bracing for a riot’ in the event Chauvin’s acquittal,” the filing said.

Lawyers for Chauvin also argued that his sentence should be reduced, as the presumptive sentence for someone without a criminal history is 150 months, while he received 270 months. They argued that “abuse of a position of authority” is not an aggravating factor that would allow for his upward sentencing.

Chauvin’s lawyers also claimed that a police officer cannot be convicted for felony murder under Minnesota law and that Chauvin was authorized to “touch” Floyd when Floyd resisted arrest.

“Chauvin is a police officer statutorily authorized to commit ‘assaults’ to effect an arrest,” they stated in the filing.

Later, the attorneys claimed that “in order for a police officer to be convicted of murder, Minnesota statutes require the officer to be using ‘deadly force’ — force one knows will cause either death or ‘great bodily harm.’ Putting your knees on the back of a suspect does not create a ‘substantial risk of causing, death or great bodily harm.'”

The court telling the jury that “it is not necessary for the State to prove that [Chauvin] intended to inflict substantial bodily harm” is a “material misstatement of the law,” Chauvin’s attorneys argued.

In the filing, the lawyers claimed this statement invited the jury to apply strict liability, a standard of liability that means the defendant could be responsible for the consequences of an action even in the absence of criminal intent.

Lawyers also claimed there was “prosecutorial misconduct,” including discovery violations and failures to disclose, starting with the state “largely ignoring the Court’s initial discovery deadline.”

“The State’s pervasive, intentional discovery violations, alone, were sufficiently prejudicial as to require a new trial,” the filing stated.

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(GRAND RAPIDS, Mich.) — Nearly three weeks after Patrick Lyoya was killed, the Grand Rapids police chief on Monday identified the officer who fatally shot Lyoya as Christopher Schurr.

Lyoya, a native of Congo, was shot in the head on April 4 after Schurr pulled him over for an unregistered license plate. Video footage of the incident shows Schurr struggling with Lyoya, eventually forcing him to the ground and shouting, “stop resisting,” “let go” and “drop the Taser,” before shooting Lyoya.

While Grand Rapids attorney Ven Johnson and civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who are representing the Lyoya family, have been calling for the name of the officer to be released since the day Lyoya was killed, now that it’s happened, Johnson said knowing the name does little to console the family.

“Our clients literally buried their son Friday. … This doesn’t do a whole lot, and it’s something that should have been done at the time when they released the videos,” Johnson told ABC News, adding that Lyoya’s parents “feel like they’re getting red tape after red tape after red tape.”

Chief Eric Winstrom had refrained from releasing the name of the officer as the investigation was ongoing, arguing the city has a long-standing policy not to release the names of employees under investigation.

“How dare you hold the name of a man who killed this man?” civil rights activist Al Sharpton said at Lyoya’s funeral in Grand Rapids on Friday. “Every time a young Black man or woman is arrested in this town, you put their name all over the news. Every time we’re suspected of something, you put our name out there.”

Winstrom released a statement Monday saying he decided to identify Schurr “in the interest of transparency, to reduce ongoing speculation and to avoid any further confusion.”

While the name has been released, Johnson said it’s “too little, too late.”

“They hid the name of this officer who killed my client for three weeks, and yet as part of their press release, they say this is in the spirit of transparency,” Johnson told ABC News. “Well, if I said to you, I’m gonna be transparent with you, but I’m gonna hide material facts … for three weeks, they will look at me and say, just, that’s not fair.”

After Schurr’s name was released, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer released a statement saying the investigation should be wrapping up “quickly” and said her “heart is with the Grand Rapids community.”

While no charges have been filed against Schurr, Johnson said his team is prepared but hopes the state will do better in the future for preventing these events.

“In Michigan, we have a lot of hard work we need to do,” Johnson said.

Schurr is currently on administrative leave and has been stripped of all his police power as the investigation continues. ABC News was not able to reach an attorney for Schurr.

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(NEW YORK) — West Virginia had the highest opioid overdose death rate per capita in the country last year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

OxyContin, a prescription drug that helped fuel the crisis, was heavily marketed in towns across the state and its use spread among residents of all ages, experts said.

“Nobody was prepared. Nobody knew that they were going to get a drug that was supposed to help alleviate pain,” Maegan Malcomb, a woman recovering from addiction in West Virginia, told ABC News.

While first responders and doctors in the state scramble to save people from these decades of danger, they also are fighting a new phase of the crisis as fentanyl overdoses have jumped in the area.

Doctors and medical experts said there is a straight timeline from the rise in opioid prescriptions to fentanyl overdoses in places like West Virginia.

When OxyContin was first introduced into the market, Purdue Pharmaceuticals misled medical professionals contending the company’s pain killer drug was far less addictive than other opioids. In 2007, the company paid $600 million in criminal penalties after admitting to misbranding OxyContin.

Two years ago, Purdue admitted that it marketed dangerous opioids to health care providers despite having reason to believe those providers were diverting drugs and that often led to abuse, according to the Department of Justice.

Lou Ortenzio, a former West Virginia doctor, told ABC News he has been feeling guilt for the years that he prescribed OxyContin.

“I never envisioned prescribing somebody with pain would have this catastrophic tidal wave effect,” he said.

Ortenzio himself became addicted to prescription pain pills, taking as many as 30 pills a day before he got help. Today, he helps run a recovery clinic in West Virginia for other people living with addiction or in recovery.

Malcomb told ABC News that she got addicted to opioids by the time she was 16. The mother of three said by the time she was 18, she didn’t know one person who wasn’t addicted to opioids.

“All I’ve ever known is addiction. And most of the people that I love, the people that I grew up with, that’s all they’ve known, too,” she said.

Even though OxyContin and other related pills are harder to prescribe, there is a population of West Virginians who are still suffering from addiction and have found an alternative to those prescription pain pills – primarily heroin, health experts said.

But by substituting a new drug, those suffering from addiction are putting themselves at a bigger risk, the experts warned.

Fentanyl has been found in as much as 70% of the nation’s heroin supply, according to the CDC. In many cases, those who use heroin have no idea that fentanyl has been added until it’s too late.

First responders in the town of Clarksburg, West Virginia, told ABC News that they respond to calls related to fentanyl-related overdoses daily. In one day they responded to three overdose calls.

“It’s poison, it’s pure poison. You don’t know what it is, ” Michael Veltri, a Clarksburg EMS, told ABC News.

Last year, fentanyl was the leading cause of death for Americans between the ages of 25 and 44, according to the CDC. And some fear it’s only going to get worse.

Dr. Stephen Loyd, also developed an opioid addiction, but is currently in recovery. He runs a recovery center in Nashville, and told ABC News that his facility loses several patients a week due to fentanyl.

“There are not weeks that go by that we don’t,” he told ABC News.

Loyd said there is a direct link between the rise of OxyContin prescriptions in the 1990s and 2000s and the current fentanyl crisis in the country.

“These folks that are coming in with fentanyl, 98% of them got started with pain pills,” he said.

Loyd and other experts said that the country will have to work harder to help those living with addiction , particularly in places like West Virginia that were the hardest hit during the crisis.

Malcomb told ABC News that the only way to deal with a drug problem is to deal with people directly and persevere.

“I have no choice if I don’t want to die,” she responded when asked if she’d continue her recovery. “[I’m] surprised I’m not dead now.”

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(SAN JOSE, Calif.) — A 3-month-old baby boy has been found safe Tuesday after he was taken from his Northern California home in what police believe was a premeditated kidnapping.

One suspect is in custody, police said.

Brandon Cuellar’s kidnapping was reported around 1 p.m. Monday by his grandmother, who was watching the baby while the mother was at work, San Jose Police Sgt. Christian Camarillo said at a news conference.

The grandmother said she came home, took Brandon inside the apartment and went back to the car to unload groceries, Camarillo said.

In that “short amount of time,” a man went into the apartment and took the little boy, he said. Police released footage of the man they say was seen on surveillance video leaving with the 3-month-old.

Camarillo said the suspect brought a baby carrier with him to the home.

“We believe this was planned. It’s not some random act,” he said.

Camarillo said Tuesday that police are speaking with a female person of interest, but added that she’s not been “formally charged yet.”

“This is a person that was with the grandmother yesterday when they went shopping. She was present at the apartment complex when this happened,” Camarillo said.

“That person has changed their story a couple of times — a lot of inconsistencies,” Camarillo said.

ABC News’ Bonnie McLean contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — After years of failed attempts to reform Rikers Island, a federal judge in Manhattan on Tuesday will consider whether to put New York City’s sprawling and troubled jail complex under control of the court.

Judge Laura Taylor Swain in 2014 appointed a federal monitor but Rikers, part of the New York City Department of Correction, remains plagued by staffing problems, physical deterioration and violence.

Fifteen inmates died in custody last year and three have died so far in 2022.

There were more than five dozen stabbings in March alone.

Damien Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, expressed alarm at the level of violence. He raised the possibility of federal receivership to force change.

“The jails are in a state of crisis, inmates and staff are being seriously injured, and action is desperately needed now,” Williams said in a letter to the court. “Based on our experience over the last six years and the sustained non-compliance with key Consent Judgment provisions and the three subsequent Remedial Orders entered by this Court, our Office is very concerned about whether the Department and City have the ability, expertise, and will to swiftly make the changes necessary to bring true reform to this deeply troubled agency.”

The administration of New York City Mayor Eric Adams, in its own letter to the court, insisted it is making progress and asked for more time.

“The extraordinary measure of ordering a receivership is not merited and DOJ’s reference to it, less than four months into Commissioner Molina’s term, is unfair,” said Kimberly Joyce of the New York City Law Department. “The commissioner has taken more far-reaching action than has previously been demonstrated.”

Swain has ordered Correction Commissioner Louis Molina to attend the afternoon hearing, marking the first time all the stakeholders will convene since the possibility of a federal takeover was raised.

ABC News has previously documented the horror at Rikers. Exclusive material from Diane Sawyer’s project aired as a full episode of Nightline.

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(SANTA FE, N.M.) — The Santa Fe Sheriff’s Department’s investigation into the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of Rust is “nearing completion,” Adan Mendoza, the Santa Fe County sheriff, said in an interview Tuesday on Good Morning America.

Hutchins died and the film’s director was hospitalized after a gun held by Alec Baldwin as a prop fired a live round on the set of Rust last October.

The department is waiting for an FBI report with analysis of the firearm, the munitions, the prints and DNA as well as a report from the office of the medical investigator and analysis of cellphone data before the investigation can be completed, Mendoza said.

“The FBI has stated that it might be a few weeks before they finalize their report so we are hoping in weeks and not months,” Mendoza said, referring to when the investigation could come to a close.

On Monday, the sheriff’s office released evidence from its investigation, including hours of body cam video, witness interviews and crime scene photos.

An attorney representing the Hutchins family said they were “surprised” by the release of the evidence while the investigation is still active and ongoing but did not comment further.

Mendoza said the department was required to release the evidence in response to a public records request and it was doing so in an effort to be “transparent” in its investigation.

While it has been more than six months since the incident happened, Mendoza said the case is complicated and the department is doing the best that it can.

“As you can see with the enormous amount of information that we’ve released, the investigative report is 200 plus pages, it’s very complicated. It’s very convoluted. There is an enormous amount of information, so in order to do a thorough report, I think we’re doing the best that we can with the time frame that we have,” Mendoza said.

Mendoza said no one has come forward and admitted to bringing ammunition to the set, but there was at least one live round that was fired from the weapon.

The film’s producers were fined last week for failures that led to what the New Mexico Environment Department’s Occupational Health and Safety Bureau called an “avoidable death.”

“These are two separate investigations. But I think in our investigation, you’ll see some of the same things and I’ll say it again, I think there was complacency, disorganization. They were not adhering to proper safety protocols and industry standards, to be honest, so there’s a degree of neglect,” Mendoza said.

He went on, “Whether that reaches a criminal level will be up to the district attorney to determine.”

The sheriff would not comment on whether Baldwin knew there were live rounds on set, but said it is “yet to be determined” whether he is vulnerable to criminal prosecution.

“The key component is also the analysis on the firearm and the FBI report. So once that’s all collected, a thorough report will be forwarded to the district attorney’s office. They’ll make the determination who is responsible, if anyone,” Mendoza said.

An analysis should show what it took to manipulate the firearm to allow it to go off and the projectiles that were on the scene, Mendoza said.

“This is a lot of information that we’re going to work in conjunction with the D.A.’s office to determine if there is criminal neglect or criminal charges,” Mendoza said.

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(NEW YORK) — Melissa Lucio was first sentenced to death in 2008 for the death of her 2-year-old daughter, Mariah Alvarez. After nearly 15 years on death row in Texas, Lucio was granted a stay of her scheduled April 27 execution by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on Monday.

Calls for a court to review her case and save Lucio’s life grew this week, garnering bipartisan support and inspiring rallies across the country. Rep. Jeff Leach, chair of the Texas House Criminal Justice Reform, Interim Study Committee, was one of several legislators to speak in support of Lucio’s request for clemency.

“I believe so strongly that the system has failed Melissa Lucio at nearly every turn,” Leach said in the committee’s first hearing on April 12, days after visiting Lucio in solitary confinement at Mountain View Unit in Gatesville, Texas.

“What I want to know more than anything as a citizen of this great state — is that the system can be trusted, that it’s fair, that it’s reliable. And right now, I have, as a policymaker, severe and sincere questions and concerns about whether that’s true,” he said, urging the importance of “pushing the pause button” on Lucio’s execution.

“I thank God for my life,” Lucio said in a statement reacting to the stay. “I am grateful the Court has given me the chance to live and prove my innocence. Mariah is in my heart today and always. I am grateful to have more days to be a mother to my children and a grandmother to my grandchildren.”

Lucio’s case will now head back to the 138th State District Court in South Texas, where Cameron County District Attorney Luis Saenz will decide how to retry it. Saenz has the options of taking the case back to trial with a new jury of her peers, offering her a plea deal or dropping the charges. ABC News has reached out to Saenz for comment.

Lucio’s eldest son, John Lucio, addressed the media after an eight-hour visit with his mother on Monday — the longest he’s been allowed since she was incarcerated — saying he would “keep on fighting this fight” until his mother is freed.

“I’ve chosen to fight for my mother because she’s fought for me,” John Lucio told ABC News.

He said the last 15 years have taken a toll on him and his family as they maintain her innocence in a crime that her lawyers said never occurred.

“Medical evidence shows that Mariah’s death was consistent with an accident,” Vanessa Potkin, director of special litigation at the Innocence Project and one of Melissa Lucio’s attorneys, said in a statement after the stay was issued.

“But for the state’s use of false testimony, no juror would have voted to convict Melissa of capital murder because no murder occurred,” Potkin said.

Paramedics arrived at Melissa Lucio’s residence in 2007 to find Mariah unresponsive. Lucio told them Mariah had fallen down a steep staircase two days earlier during the family’s move to a new apartment but did not seem injured at the time. Her story came into question, however, when paramedics assessed the scene.

One responder testified he became suspicious of Melissa after observing her single-story apartment and seemingly distant behavior.

“She didn’t act at all like what I would expect of a mother,” he said according to Lucio’s habeas petition.

“The paramedic looked at these three steps that led to their front door and he testified at trial, but he didn’t believe her story. He found it to be suspicious because how could the child have been injured from these few steps?” Potkin said. “But of course, this was a complete misunderstanding, and Melissa was talking about the staircase at their home that they had just moved from.”

According to a clemency petition filed by her lawyers, Lucio asserted her innocence over 100 times during a five-hour interrogation before telling police, “I guess I did it.”

“She didn’t want to say she murdered my sister and she didn’t. I know she did not … But she was basically forced to say she did,” John Lucio said.

Some jurors who initially voted to convict Lucio have expressed doubts about whether the 53-year-old mother was granted a fair trial.

“I was disheartened to learn that there was additional evidence that was not presented at trial. I believe that Ms. Lucio deserves a new trial and for a new jury to hear this evidence,” jury foreperson Melissa Quintanilla stated in her clemency petition declaration. “Knowing what I know now, I don’t think she should be executed.”

Another juror, Johnny Galvan Jr., said he felt “pressured” to agree with the guilty verdict that resulted in Melissa Lucio’s death sentence.

“We made the wrong decision because they gave us the wrong information,” he told ABC News. “There was evidence withheld that was not presented to the jury.”

None of Lucio’s children were called to testify during her original trial, including one who said he saw Mariah fall down the stairs.

“That would have made Melissa’s case a truthful statement that her baby fell. They left it out. They told us to ignore it,” Galvan Jr. said, adding that the jury “got it wrong.”

“We need to learn that the criminal justice system fails sometimes. And we certainly failed,” he added.

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(NEW YORK) — The family of the teenager who died after falling from an amusement park ride in Florida told ABC News’ Good Morning America that his death was preventable.

“This could’ve been prevented … it should’ve been prevented,” Nekia Dodd, the mother of Tyre Sampson, told GMA. “So as an operator, you have a job to check those rides, you know. The video I saw, that was not done. And if it was done, it should’ve been done more than once, you know.”

Sampson, 14, died after falling from a ride at ICON Park in Orlando on March 24. His parents filed a civil wrongful death lawsuit on Monday.

Dodd and Tyre Sampson’s father, Yarnell Sampson, filed the lawsuit in the 9th Circuit Court in Orange County, Florida, accusing ICON Park in Orlando and other defendants, including the manufacturer and the operator of the FreeFall thrill ride, of negligence.

“Tyre had a long and prosperous life in front of him that was cut short by this tragic event,” the lawsuit states.

“Orlando Slingshot continues to fully cooperate with the State during its investigation, and we will continue to do so until it has officially concluded,” Trevor Arnold, attorney for Orlando Slingshot, said in a statement to ABC News. “We reiterate that all protocols, procedures and safety measures provided by the manufacturer of the ride were followed. We look forward to working with the Florida legislature to implement change in the industry and we are also supportive of the concepts outlined by State Representative Geraldine Thompson to make changes to state law through the ‘Tyre Sampson Bill’ to prevent a tragic accident like this from ever happening again.”

Last week, officials listed operator error as the primary suspected cause in the death of Sampson, who slipped out of his seat on a drop-tower ride and fell more than 100 feet to the pavement.

Sampson’s parents are scheduled to hold a news conference with their attorneys Tuesday to discuss the legal action.

You can watch the full interview with Dodd Tuesday morning on GMA.

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(ORLANDO, Fla.) — The parents of a 14-year-old boy who fell to his death in March from the world’s tallest tower drop ride at a Florida amusement park filed a civil wrongful death lawsuit on Monday alleging park officials failed to warn riders of “unreasonably dangerous and foreseeable risks.”

The tragedy unfolded on March 24 when Tyre Sampson, who was on spring break, slipped out of his seat and fell more than 100 feet to his death, according to the lawsuit.

Sampson’s mother and father, Nekia Dodd and Yarnell Sampson, filed the lawsuit in the 9th Circuit Court in Orange County, Florida, accusing ICON Park in Orlando and other defendants, including the manufacturer and the operator of the FreeFall thrill ride, of negligence.

“Tyre had a long and prosperous life in front of him that was cut short by this tragic event,” the lawsuit states, adding that the teenager was an honor student and football player at his school in St. Louis.

Sampson’s parents are scheduled to hold a news conference with their attorneys Tuesday morning to discuss the legal action.

The lawsuit comes a week after Florida state officials announced the findings of a forensic engineer’s field investigation report on the incident that killed Sampson.

The report showed that the operator of the FreeFall ride, which is the world’s tallest free-standing drop tower at a height of 430 feet, “made manual adjustments to the ride resulting in it being unsafe.”

The report by Quest Engineering & Failure Analysis, Inc., said manual manipulations were made to the seat Sampson was sitting in to allow the harness restraint opening to be loosened, apparently to accommodate the more than 300-pound teenager. The investigation found Sampson’s harness restraint opening was “almost double that of a normal restraint opening range.”

Nikki Fried, the Florida commissioner of agriculture and consumer services, said the adjustment by the individual operator, who was not identified in the report, enabled the FreeFall’s sensor lights to illuminate, “improperly satisfying” the ride’s electronic safety mechanisms and enabling the ride to operate “even though Mr. Sampson was not properly secured in his seat.”

Fried said the initial permit inspection for the new ride was done in December and no deficiencies were found.

“We followed the protocols, we followed the manual and everything was up to par per the manual of the manufacturer,” Fried told reporters.

She said the investigation into the incident is ongoing.

Besides the amusement park, the lawsuit names as defendants Extreme Amusement Rides, the ride’s owner and operator that also does business under the name The SlingShot Group of Companies; the ride’s manufacturer, Funtime Handels GMBH of Austria; and Keator Construction, LLC, the general contractor responsible for building the attraction.

Also named as a defendant was the Gerstlauer Amusement Rides, a Germany-based company that manufactured the seats and safety harnesses for the FreeFall.

The state investigation determined that the “normal” restraint opening for seats on the FreeFall ride was 3.33 inches. Sampson’s seat was adjusted before the ride started to an opening of 7.19 inches, the investigation found.

Florida state Rep. Geraldine Thompson, D-Orlando, said at a news conference last week that the manufacturer’s guidelines for the FreeFall specifically say the maximum weight of a rider is 250 pounds.

On the day of the incident, Sampson was 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighed 380 pounds, according to the lawsuit.

“No weight or height restrictions were posted at the ticket counter, and no ICON or SlingShot defendant employees, agents, apparent agents, servants or contractors advised Tyre about any weight or height restrictions,” the lawsuit contends.

The lawsuit alleges that ICON Park and The SlingShot Group “knew or should have known” from its own tests that riders of the FreeFall would be “subject to unreasonably dangerous and foreseeable risks, and that serious injury and death of the occupants in the ride could result.”

ICON Park had no immediate comment on the lawsuit, but a spokesperson told ABC News attorneys for the park are expected to release a statement soon.

Trevor Arnold, an attorney for The SlingShot Group said in a statement released to ABC News on Monday that the company “continues to fully cooperate with the state during its investigation, and we will continue to do so until it has officially concluded.”

“We reiterate that all protocols, procedures and safety measures provided by the manufacturer of the ride were followed,” Arnold said. “We look forward to working with the Florida legislature to implement change in the industry, and we are also supportive of the concepts outlined by State Representative Geraldine Thompson to make changes to state law through the ‘Tyre Sampson Bill’ to prevent a tragic accident like this from ever happening again.”

In a statement last week to ABC News, ICON Park it was “deeply troubled” by the state’s preliminary investigation that found the ride operator misadjusted the harness and safety sensor light on the FreeFall. “ICON Park is committed to providing a safe, fun experience for families. We will continue to support the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services with their ongoing investigation,” the amusement park said.

A representative for Keator Construction said the company had no comment. Funtime Handels GMBH and Gerstlauer Amusement Rides have yet to respond to ABC News’ requests for comment.

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(NEW YORK) — For the second consecutive week, new COVID-19 infection rates among children in the U.S. have seen a notable increase, according to a new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the Children’s Hospital Association (CHA).

Last week, 37,000 additional child COVID-19 cases were reported, an increase of about 43% from two weeks ago. The jump in infections follows weeks of steady declines, and marks the first increase since January.

Overall, numbers remain significantly lower than during other surges of the pandemic. However, many Americans, who are taking at-home tests, are not submitting their results to their local public health authorities. Thus, health experts said that daily case totals are likely significantly higher than the numbers officially reported and tallied.

In the Northeast, infection rates are at their highest level in eight weeks, while the Midwest is reporting its highest proportion of new cases since the end of February.

A total of 12.9 million children have tested positive for the virus since the pandemic, and children represent about a fifth of all reported cases on record.

Nationally, pediatric virus-related hospital admissions have also seen their first increase in three months — up by 5% in the last week, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

However, AAP and CHA report that a small percentage of pediatric cases have resulted in hospitalization and death.

According to the nearly two dozen states, which reported pediatric hospitalizations, 0.1%-1.5% of all child COVID-19 cases resulted in hospitalization. ​Similarly, in states which reported virus-related deaths by age, 0.00%-0.27% of all child COVID-19 cases resulted in death.

Even so, health experts stress that any uptick in severe illness among children is concerning.

The increases in pediatric COVID cases are renewing calls for children to be inoculated against COVID-19. Although the COVID-19 has been authorized under emergency use for all children over the age of 5 for nearly six months, tens of millions of children remain completely unvaccinated.

At this time, just under 26 million children, over the age of 5 — about half of those eligible — remain completely unvaccinated, and overall, just 43.1% of eligible children have been fully vaccinated.

Many parents of young children have also been vocalizing their frustration over the delayed rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine for children under the age of five.

Top Biden administration officials said those shots could be available as early as June.

Both Moderna or Pfizer have yet to fully submit their vaccine data to the Food and Drug Administration, the agency said last week, but Moderna, which has a two-dose vaccine for children under five, is expected to officially file a request for authorization by the end of the month, a spokesperson for the company confirmed.

Pfizer, which has been conducting clinical trials on a three-dose vaccine for kids under five, is expected to have results by early May, is projecting an authorization of its three-dose vaccine sometime in June, according to the company’s CEO, Albert Bourla.

“I am frustrated on their behalf,” White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha told CNN’s “State of the Union,” said, in reference to some of his friends, who are frustrated that vaccines for young children have yet to be authorized.

It’s “very hard to prejudge a specific date and time” as to when these vaccines will become available, Jha said, adding that he expects the shots to be available in the “next couple months.”

AAP and CHA noted there is an “urgent” need to collect more age-specific data to assess the severity of illness related to new variants as well as potential longer-term effects.

“It is important to recognize there are immediate effects of the pandemic on children’s health, but importantly we need to identify and address the long-lasting impacts on the physical, mental, and social well-being of this generation of children and youth,” the organizations wrote.

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