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WHO Updates Guidelines On COVID-19 Related Organ Inflammation in Children


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November 25, 2021 at 2:21 PM

Children who have developed organ inflammation linked to COVID-19 infection should be given steroid treatment in hospital, the World Health Organization, (WHO), said on Tuesday.

The updated recommendation from the UN health agency comes after it first described Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children Associated With COVID-19, or MIS-C for short, last May.

"MIS-C is a rare but serious condition where children with COVID-19 develop inflammation affecting different organs of the body", WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier told journalists at a scheduled briefing in Geneva.

"Children with this condition need specialized care and may need to be admitted to intensive care. Although MIS-C is a serious condition, with the right medical care, children with this condition recover".

Most kids 'low-risk'

Mr. Lindmeier said that although youngsters remain at a low risk of developing severe or critical COVID-19, some underlying factors make them more susceptible to developing serious organ inflammation from the coronavirus.

These conditions include obesity, chronic lung disease - including asthma - cardiovascular disease and immunosuppression.

WHO issued its recommendation after analysing data from three observational studies that pooled the experiences of 885 patients.

COVID sweeping Europe

Meanwhile, the WHO European Region remains firmly in the pandemic's grip. Last week, reported COVID- related deaths increased to close to 4,200 a day, doubling from 2100 deaths a day at the end of September.

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