In Lucknow, almost 60% of 101 COVID-19 patients, who had succumbed to the disease till 1^st August, were brought in advanced stage of the disease to the hospital. The common causes in all these deaths were that the patients had breathing problems and expired due to respiratory failure. The coronavirus infection had damaged their lungs severely.

According to the experts, the fact that an important and known symptom of the disease, which is the breathlessness is being unnoticed by people either due to ignorance or self-denial or maybe even due to the fear of revealing their status for several reasons.

Breathlessness occurs as the coronavirus infection attacks lungs, which results in hypoxemia (very low blood oxygen levels in the body) and if not addressed on time can lead to respiratory and multi-organ failure.

TOI had analyzed the data acquired from hospitals and found that 62 victims (60%) who came to the hospital were in the advanced stage of the disease. Out of these, 36 patients died within 24 hours of admission, 38 patients had no comorbidity and 31 patients were in the age group of 41-60 years.

Virologist and former head of Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences microbiology department, Prof TN Dhole, said that these deaths specify that people may possibly couldn’t realize that they were infected by the coronavirus. Short breath is a sign that a person is breathing fast to get more oxygen. It happens in COVID-19 as the virus attacks the lungs and serious symptoms might emerge later.

In maximum cases, patients don’t know that breathlessness is a symptom of COVID-19. They only considered fever and cough as the coronavirus symptom. King Georges Medical University spokesman Prof Sudhir Singh said that highlighting the necessity for a massive awareness campaign predominantly in the economically weaker sections.

Prof Kausar Usman from KGMU’s medicine department, also said that self-denial (it cannot happen to me) or self-diagnosis (might be due to some other cause) are responsible for the delayed testing and treatment. In few cases, patients think that breathlessness is due to humid weather or due to a heart ailment. Apart from the breathlessness, loss of taste is also a sign of COVID-19.

Prof Santosh Kumar, pulmonary medicine department of KGMU said that few people don’t report early due to fear of being kept in ‘isolation’ in the hospital.

Prof Dhole said that people can keep an oximeter at home to regularly measure oxygen levels. The normal oxygen saturation level is between 95%-100%. If it remains low for some time then seek medical assistance immediately. If one can’t afford an oximeter then keep a watch for numbness in limbs or difficulty in getting up to walk as these are also indications of low oxygen levels.

Source : ET Health world