A mysterious new coronavirus-related illness has been haunting children for the last three weeks, as several cases emerged around the world with children suffering from rashes all over the body. The mysterious illness has baffled medical experts and is being described as an 'inflammatory syndrome' which is similar to Kawasaki disease and toxic shock syndrome.
However, the link between the illness and coronavirus still remains unclear as some children have tested positive for the pandemic while the others have tested negative. Just a week ago, doctors from Birmingham indicated a link to coronavirus and the new mysterious illness harming children and released a report saying the illness ''is caused by coronavirus.'' But now the Chief Scientist of the World Health Organisation, Soumya Swaminathan, revealed that it may not be the case.
No connection to coronavirus?
Swaminathan spoke to the BBC, saying that it still remains unclear if there's any connection between coronavirus and the mysterious illness and stated that more studies need to be done to shed light on why children are suffering. "Very recently there have been some reports of children getting admitted with a strange syndrome, something that looks like sepsis, something that looks like a disease called Kawasaki disease, which causes inflammation in the blood vessels.''
The WHO Chief Scientist revealed that the organization has asked doctors to give out clear reports about the illness so they can learn about it as quickly as possible. ''Now, it's not very clear what the links are between Covid-19 and this syndrome. There are some children who tested positive for the virus and some who haven't.''
She further added: ''The WHO has discussed this with a group of international Pediatricians about how to approach this, and the need to collect more data. We put out a note two days ago, which requests doctors to provide information in a standardised format so that we can quickly learn as much as possible about the syndrome. But again to re-emphasise the risks to children are extremely low with this infection, and there have not been many cases."
The first mysterious case was reported in UK
The United Kingdom was the first to report the mysterious illness among children a month ago and now the illness has spread to the US, France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland. France's Health Minister, Olivier Veran, confirmed that the illness has been seen in ''about 15 children of all ages,'' and listed out ''fever, digestive issues and vascular inflammation'' as the key symptoms.
