75% of children affected by rare post-covid disease are BAME

The rare post-covid syndrome affecting children was already alarming doctors in the first wave of the pandemic and causing great confusion.

Doctors are very worried about the new phenomenon affecting children in the UK. Up to 100 children are being taken to the hospital with a rare paediatric inflammatory multi-system syndrome (PIMS) showing up after getting Covid and according to a study 75% of the children are from black, Asian or other ethnic minority (BAME).

Rare disease hits 1 in 100 children

The rare post-covid syndrome had alarmed doctors in the first wave of the pandemic and caused great confusion. The rare condition was initially thought to be Kawasaki disease, but afterwards it was recognised as a different syndrome that one in 5,000 children can get one month after getting coronavirus.

The paediatric inflammatory multi-system syndrome (PIMS) gives children rashes and a 40C temperature, low blood pressure and potentially toxic shock or sepsis. Two children are believed to have died from PIMS since the start of the pandemic and numbers now are getting higher than in the first wave as hospitals are now admitting up to 100 children a week. Cases of covid have been registered mostly in London and south-east England where also the Kent variant has been cause worst infections.

A report made by Dr Hermione Lyall, expert in infectious diseases in children showed that 78 patients with PIMS ended up in intensive care , 47% are Afro-caribbean and 28% from Asian background, 5 to 6 times higher than the 14% of UK’s population who are BAME.

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