GURUGRAM: A four-year-old girl with leukaemia was among three persons who died in the city on Friday after testing positive for Covid. Officials said she was the youngest Covid patient to have succumbed to the infection in the current wave so far.
Daily cases, meanwhile, crossed 3,000 again after hovering around the 2,800-mark for two days.
A total of 3,509 people tested positive on Friday, up from Thursday’s 2,845. With this, the positivity rate also shot up from 22.6% to 34%, which is the highest in this wave so far. Gurugram now has 25,306 active cases. The hospitalization rate has remained consistently low. As of Friday, 175 Covid patients were undergoing treatment in hospitals.
The four-year-old girl who died was suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and was admitted to a private hospital on January 3 for it. The girl, who was undergoing chemotherapy, tested positive while undergoing treatment and suffered a cardiac arrest on Friday.
The other patient who succumbed to the infection was a 40-year-old woman, who also had lymphoblastic leukaemia. She was hospitalised on January 11 for blood transfusion and put on ventilator support after testing positive. Doctors said she was yet to complete her vaccine doses.
The third patient — a 32-year-old man — was fully vaccinated and did not have any comorbidities, doctors said. He was admitted to a hospital on January 16 with fever, vomiting, decreased appetite and fatigue. He was found to have Covid a couple of days later and suffered a cardiac arrest on Friday.
In the past 11 days, the city has reported 15 Covid deaths — one on January 10, another on January 12, two on January 14, one each on January 15 and 16, two each on January 17, 19 and 20 and three on January 21. So far, 942 people have died after testing positive for Covid in Gurugram. At least 624 of these patients had comorbidities, officials said. Officials in the health department said those with comorbidities should be kept under watch all the more, especially those in hospitals.
“Covid is becoming nosocomial (originating in hospital) now, which is why the fatalities are increasing. The deaths that are happening are incidental findings. People who have comorbidities are getting infected while getting admitted to hospitals for other health issues. Everyone needs to take all kinds of precautions while visiting hospitals, especially those with comorbidities,” said Virender Yadav, the chief medical officer.
Doctors pointed out that although more children were testing positive in the current wave, only a few in the city had have needed hospitalisation. Most kids, they said, were not exhibiting severe respiratory problems or seeing a fall in oxygen saturation.
“Some children develop persistent vomiting, which does not respond to oral antiemetic medicines. Such kids may need intravenous drip in the hospital for a day or two. Children tend to have convulsions in fever of any type, including Covid. They may need to be hospitalised for 1-2 days. Other reasons for hospitalisation include high fever, loose motions and almost zero oral intake,” said Dr Krishan Chugh, director and HOD of paediatrics at Fortis Hospital. Friday’s positivity rate of 34% is the highest in the city in this wave. On January 18, the positivity rate was 31% when the city conducted 10,191 tests. On Friday, 10,401 samples were examined.
