Hospitalizations of young children with the virus surged during the U.S. Omicron wave.

Babies and children younger than age 5 were hospitalized with coronavirus at much higher rates during the latest U.S. surge, when the highly transmissible Omicron variant was dominant, compared with earlier periods in the pandemic, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Hospitalizations of these children were about five times higher during the Omicron surge, between Dec. 19 and Feb. 19, than during the . . .