Strange Covid syndrome leads dozens of children to intensive care in Britain

At least 100 British boys a week are hospitalized with a very rare disease, which developed after coronavirus, and all end up in intensive care.

The prestigious journal The Guardian he got the information exclusively and explained that “75 per cent of children most affected by pediatric multisystem inflammatory syndrome post-viral are at Great Ormond St Hospital in London”.

The strange condition mainly affects “ethnic minorities” and “the most vulnerable in society”, probably directly linked to poverty. It was initially linked to Kawasaki syndrome.

“Up to 100 children per week are hospitalized with a rare disease, which can appear weeks after Covid-19, leaving them in intensive care,” doctors said. The Guardian.

“In a phenomenon that worries pediatricians, 75% of the children most affected by pediatric multisystem inflammatory syndrome (PIMS) are black, Asian or ethnic minorities. Almost four in five children were previously healthy, ”according to an unpublished case study.

When PIMS emerged in the first wave of the pandemic, “it caused confusion among doctors, concern among heads of the NHS (UK health services) and alarm among parents. It was initially thought to be “Kawasaki disease”, a rare disease that mainly affects babies.

Symptoms

But PIMS “has been recognized as a new distinct post-viral syndrome, that one in 5,000 children contracts about a month after having Covid, whether or not they have symptoms, ”according to the scoop of the British newspaper.

Often the symptoms are rash, temperature up to 40 ° C, dangerously low blood pressure and abdominal problems.

In severe cases, your symptoms may be like those of toxic shock or life-threatening sepsis. Two children are believed to have died from PIMS since the start of the pandemic.

Although specialists do not believe that the frequency of the disease has increased compared to cases in the general community, “the number of these cases is higher than in the first wave”.

Hospitals reportedly admitted up to 100 young people per week during the second wave, up from around 30 per week last April.

Between 12 and 15 children have fallen ill every day since the beginning of January. Cases have arisen in many places. But “most have been recorded in London and the south-east of England, regions where the new Kent variant of the coronavirus has caused a sharp increase in infections,” it was reported.

Poverty disease?

Evidence compiled by Dr Hermione Lyall, a specialist in infectious diseases in children and clinical director of children’s services at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust in London, revealed that “the disproportionate impact of the disease on children from ethnic minorities“.

In a video presentation attended by over 1,000 pediatricians, he showed that in a “first nationwide report” of 78 PIMS patients who ended up in intensive care, 47% were of Afro-Caribbean origin and 28% of Asian origin: between five and six times more than the 14% of the British population who are BAME ”, according to The Guardian.

Dr Liz Whittaker, PIMS spokesperson for the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health, said The Guardian: “We are trying to understand why this population is affected. Genetics can play a role. But we are concerned that this reflects how much of a disease of poverty, which disproportionately affects those who cannot avoid exposure due to their occupation, multigenerational households and overcrowded housing.

Separate data collected by Dr Marie White of the Evelina Children’s Hospital showed that “60% of the 107 cases of PIMS they had treated as of January 13 were black children from Africa or the Caribbean.”

Dr Habib Naqvi, director of the NHS Observatory for Race and Health, has called for research into the much higher risk of children from ethnic minorities of contracting PIMS. “Clearly, urgent research is now needed on why black and Asian children are over-represented and more vulnerable to PIMS,” he asked.

“We are concerned about these early findings and know that structural inequalities in health can affect the lives of people of ethnic minority background throughout their lives,” he said.

Lyall’s data set, based on figures from 21 of the 23 pediatric intensive care units (PICU) in Britain, also found that 78% of patients had no underlying disease and up to the arrival of PIMS, they were in good health. very disturbing. “

The average age of children with PIMS is 11 years old, but it ranges from 8 to 14 years old. Two-thirds (67%) were children; only 22% had Covid when their PIMS appeared, while the rest already had it. Almost one in four people who end up in intensive care develop a heart disease called “dilated coronary arteries,” which is potentially fatal.

Other data presented by experts during the webinar showed that a small number of children with the condition “see their brains affected and experience confusion, lethargy, disorientation, begin to behave in unusual ways, and, in rare cases suffer from a stroke “. In addition, “in a study of 75 children, eight had suffered from heart problems, including myocarditis and ventricular dysfunction.”

Most of the children with PIMS were taken to one of the 23 hospitals in the NHS network with PICU, such as Evelina and Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospitals in London and Birmingham Children’s and Women’s Hospital. According to projections by doctors at the British Hospital Evelina, cases will peak next Monday and then start to decline.

Reopen schools

Whittaker said parents should not be alarmed by the increase in hospitalizations, as the recent incidence of PIMS is proportional to the greater impact of the pandemic on adults in recent weeks.

“PIMS can be very serious. But we have seen less seriously ill children (in the second wave) because the recognition and treatment are earlier, ”he explained.

Specialists do not consider this to be a reason not to open schools. “It’s still weird. We don’t think parents should be concerned as it is much more likely not to affect their children but rather them. The numbers are low and PIMS would not be a reason to prevent the opening of schools. The median age of onset is nine years. We would not close the children’s play areas, ”he said. The Guardian.

In Britain there are areas in schools or parks for children’s play.

British schools will reopen after Easter. They are now closed to the severity of the pandemic and the new Kent variant, which has spread throughout the kingdom.

Paris, correspondent