A 14-day-old boy, one of the youngest Covid-19 victims in Gujarat, died of multiple organ failures at Surat’s New Civil Hospital on Wednesday.
The family of the infant is from Uchhal village of Tapi district reported no illness at the time of the birth and the mother had a normal delivery. But few days later health of the baby suddenly deteriorated and the infant was taken to Vyara General Hospital on Sunday.
It was reported that the baby tested positive for Covid-19 in the rapid antigen tests and the doctors referred him to NCH as he required critical care. At NCH too, he tested positive.
Dr. Vinod Shah, head of, pediatrics department, NCH said, “The infant had diarrhoea and fever and he not taking feed. During the detailed examination, it was found that he has septicaemia with septic shock, meningitis, encephalitis.”
“The infant also had dehydration and was put on a ventilator within a few hours of admission looking at the worsening condition. The baby did not respond to the treatment and died on Wednesday morning,” he said.
In this context Healthwire Media spoke to expert Dr. Gauri Agarwal, IVF specialist, Founder: Seeds of Innocence to understand, Is the second COVID wave more dangerous for kids? and she said, “COVID-19 is affecting more children this time than the last wave. The most fatal result of this can be multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) that is an inflammation of organs such as the heart, lungs, brain, kidneys, skin, or eyes. The clinical features of MIS-C are said to be similar to Kawasaki’s diseases and toxic shock syndrome (TSS).”
“We need more knowledge on why and how such developments happen; whether certain children, especially those with existing health conditions, are more prone to such developments and how far can they recover from COVID-19,” she added.
However, doctors are witnessing a spike in the number of infections among young children in the present wave of coronavirus disease.
On April 5, 13-year-old Dhruv Korat, son of a textile unit owner, died due to a Covid-19 infection at a city-based hospital. Dhruv was suffering from muscular dystrophy that was detected three years after his birth.
