LONDON, April 28, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – Britain’s health minister said Tuesday he
was “very worried” at signs of a coronavirus-related syndrome emerging in
children but stressed it needed more research and remained very rare.
The state-run National Health Service (NHS) issued an alert at the weekend
about a small number of children presenting an unusual set of symptoms,
including abdominal pain and inflammation around the heart.
They have required admission to intensive care, according to a report in
the Health Service Journal.
“I’m very worried about the early signs that in rare cases, there is an
impact of an auto-immune response in children that causes a significant
disease,” Health Secretary Matt Hancock told LBC radio.
He added: “It’s a new disease that we think may be caused by coronavirus
and the COVID-19 virus.”
But Hancock said that while some of the children who have this new disease
tested positive for the virus, others had not.
“We’re doing a lot of research now. What I would also stress is that it is
rare. Although it is very significant for those children who do get it, the
number of cases is small,” he said.
The Guardian newspaper reported that there had been at least 12 cases.
According to the Paediatric Intensive Care Society, the NHS alert warned of
common overlapping features of toxic shock syndrome (TSS) and atypical
Kawasaki disease and blood parameters consistent with severe COVID-19.
TSS is a serious illness associated with infections while Kawasaki causes
blood vessels to become inflamed and is mostly found in children under the age
of five.
The national medical director for NHS England, Stephen Powis, said on
Monday it was “too early to say” whether the new disease was linked to
coronavirus but the issue was being looked into urgently.
England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, said it was “entirely
plausible” that it was linked to COVID-19.
Children have died from coronavirus but serious complications are rare.
“Evidence from throughout the world shows us that children appear to be the
part of the population least affected by this infection,” said Russell Viner,
president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health.
But he added: “New diseases may present in ways that surprise us, and
clinicians need to be made aware of any emerging evidence of particular
symptoms or of underlying conditions which could make a patient more
vulnerable to the virus.”