5 sickle cell patients among Vidarbha Covid deaths in 5 days

NAGPUR: Among the incidental findings counted as Covid-19 deaths in Vidarbha in the last five days, five were of sickle cell disease (SCD) patients aged between 10 and 35 years.
A 10-year-old boy died in Mayo Hospital Nagpur, a 30 year-old youth in Nagpur, a 28-year-old girl in Gadchiroli, a 35-year-old man in Gondia and a 29-year-old man in Akola. A three-month old baby who died in Buldhana on Wednesday also reportedly had sickle cell, along with other complications, but authorities could not confirm it.
Doctors told TOI that people SCD are at four times greater risk of hospitalization and twice as much risk of dying from Covid-19.Even those who carry just one copy of the sickle cell gene (the carrier status for sickle cell disease) appeared to be at a heightened risk.
Sickle cell is a major health issue in Vidarbha. Despite all the measures, prevalence of sickle cell in Central India is 22-44%. Most of the affected patients come from lower socio-economic background having financial problems.
“We have been constantly requesting the authorities to consider cickle cell patients as exception and allow vaccination of all patients, irrespective of age group,” said Dr Vinky Rughwani, founder president of Thalassaemia and Sickle Cell Centre who is also a vice-president of Maharashtra Medical Council (MMC).
Gautam Dongre, secretary National Alliance Of Sickle Cell Organisations (NASCO), underlined the need of treating sickle patient separately in case they need hospitalization for any purpose. “A person suffering from sickle cell disease will look like a normal patient but the organ damage and infection happens happens in a very short time. They have less time in hand as compared to normal patients. Our request is to have separate screening and admission for sickle patients,” he said.
Dongre rued that sickle cell patients are “ suffering due to negligence of authorities as well as researchers”. “To date, we have no specific national-level documentation of deaths due to sickle cell. In fact, we still have to rely on 20-year-old data which is there with the NHM authorities,” he said.
He also said that only two patients of SCD have got disability certificates in last the five months in Nagpur. The only sickle cell testing facility at GMCH is not functioning since last many months.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has created major health issues for sickle cell patients. Even during the second wave, many patients died at a very young age but there was hardly any documentation. In the third wave, as the number of deaths is less, we are getting worrying details about these patients,” said Dr Kshitij Suryawanshi who himself is a sickle patient.