ATHENS – While the elderly are the most susceptible to COVID-19, the Coronavirus doesn't spare anyone, with at least three children infected – along with a worker – at a shelter run by the Smile of the Child charity.

“We are afraid, just as any parent would be if their child were in a difficult situation; the only difference is that our family is much bigger,” the charity’s President Kostas Giannopoulos Giannopoulos said.

The shelter is in the southeastern neighborhood of Moschato and he told reporters at a news conference that the National Organization for Public Health (EODY) for delaying to respond to the first case at the facility, a 17-year-old boy who had a high fever, a health team not sent for three days to check on him.

EODY’s team conducted tests on 17 of the facility’s 25 children and 18 employees, a measure Giannopoulos said was insufficient. Of those 17 samples, two came back positive and belonged to children who did not have any symptoms showing.

“Everyone should have been tested given that this is a facility with a lot of people and vulnerable children,” he said, adding that EODY is sending an additional team to test the remainder of the people working or living in the house, reported Kathimerini.