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In less than two days, these cases have quadrupled in the United States, where even a five-year-old boy died of this condition.
Julia Daly, 12, recovers at home after spending 10 days in an intensive care unit. “I remember my dad telling me he had a heart problem,” he said.
Shawn, her father, was the one who lived closely the anguish of Julia’s diagnosis with Kawasaki disease. This is how he told the disturbing moment: “They made me leave the room to intubate her, and that’s when her heart stopped and she had to undergo cardiopulmonary resuscitation.”
There are now close to 100 minors admitted to hospitals in New York, Washington D.C., Atlanta and Detroit. The vast majority of them have already tested positive for COVID-19 or have the antibodies that are generated after being infected.
Pediatric cardiologist Jake Kleinmahon explained that Kawasaki disease causes “inflammation of the blood vessels, especially the coronary arteries that supply blood to the heart muscle.” Among other symptoms, health professionals have identified a high fever for several days, a rash, eye irritation, swollen glands, and stomach problems.
Although the cause is unknown, it is known that complications can be prevented with proper treatment.
These cases have led pediatricians to think that with the new coronavirus, younger ones could be exposed to a higher risk than originally thought.
Another death related to this inflammatory syndrome corresponds to a 14-year-old in England, was reported in an investigation published Wednesday by the medical journal The Lancet.
At the end of April the British National Health Service (NHS) had warned of this disease. Other countries that had detected a similar situation followed: Spain, France and Belgium, among others.
British doctors who analyzed the first eight cases observed in London wrote in The Lancet that it could be “a new phenomenon that affects children who did not show symptoms and for whom the COVID-19 infection manifests itself as a hyperinflammatory syndrome”.
The majority of affected children respond positively to treatments.
Kawasaki disease, first described in 1967, causes inflammation of the blood vessels (rashes, nodes, conjunctivitis, heart problems in its more severe types) in generally young children.
