Despite Singapore’s Covid-19 case numbers being high, just 14 people have died from the disease, all of them aged 64 and above.
That means our death rate is about 0.1 per cent, which is one of the lowest in the world, according to The Straits Times.
The low death rate here is perhaps a sign that Singapore’s healthcare system is well-equipped to handle the crisis.
However, the death rate among patients aged 80 and above is high – at 20% – and that may belie some other alarming facts about the virus.
There have been reports of blood clots and strokes occurring in 30- to 40-year-olds in New York, possibly related to Covid-19, and the medical field is perplexed.
Elsewhere in the United States, blood clots were reported to have formed in some Covid-19 patients, the Washington Post (WP) reports.
In Singapore, the death of Subbiah Sivasankar – a 37-year-old migrant worker who was warded at Khoo Teck Puat Hospital – was officially ruled as being from pulmonary thromboembolism — otherwise known as a blood clot in an artery.
His death was officially announced to be unlinked to Covid-19, even though he was infected the virus.
While there may be an assumption that complications such as stroke and organ failure in older patients are inevitable, given their advanced ages, when the same types of symptoms start to show up in much younger patients – some who have no other symptoms – it may be time to pay attention.
That means it’s no guarantee that only the elderly are in danger of being fatalities from the coronavirus, as there’s still much we don’t know about it.
According to doctors quoted in the WP article, the virus appears to affect not just the lungs – as is the case for respiratory diseases – but also the brain, heart, kidneys, intestines and liver.
This is because large blood clots can travel to the brain, causing a stroke, or heart, causing a heart attack. Thus, when one contracts the virus, it leaves them vulnerable to death from blood clots that cause heart attacks and strokes, among other things.
As an example, a 41-year-old Broadway actor who was infected with Covid-19 developed blood clots that blocked the blood from reaching his toes. It resulted in his right leg having to be amputated, reported CNN.
Scientists are suggesting that Covid-19 causes changes in patients’ blood that causes other complications within the body, and this happens in patients far below the normal age that they typically occur.
Of course, given that there are at least 3 different strains of the SARS-CoV-2 virus around the world, according to the Daily Mail, there may be differences in symptoms among patients in different continents.
The strain prevalent in the US, particularly New York, is known as Type A, while the strain most commonly seen in Singapore is Type C.
Type A is considered the closest to the coronavirus found in bats, while Types B and C are mutations — Type B spread mainly in China.
However, Type A is said to be found in patients in Singapore as well, as there have been imported cases from the US here.
Social enterprise ItsRainingRainCoats has raised alarms over the deaths of two migrant workers who were infected with Covid-19.
Their causes of death are consistent with what’s been reported in the US.
However, their deaths were announced as being related to heart attack (blockage in artery supplying the heart) and pulmonary thrombosis (blockage in artery in the lung), and not Covid-19.
If the causes of their deaths were linked to Covid-19, this would entitle them to specific insurance payouts to their families.
Thus, Singapore doctors and the authorities may have to revisit what counts as deaths related to Covid-19, as there may be effects on death tolls as well as a host of other issues like insurance.
For example, symptoms such as a loss of smell, which has reported by many Covid-19 patients, are not reflected in the Ministry of Health’s guidelines.
Perhaps the biggest takeaway here is that since deaths have occurred due to non-respiratory factors, it might not only be the elderly who are in danger.
Younger people may also fall gravely sick even if they have no underlying conditions.
While we don’t want to scare anyone, it’s something that people should think about — especially young people who think they are healthy enough to survive should they be infected.
Most importantly, everyone has to do their part and stay home to minimise risk of infection.
Featured image adapted from Facebook and MS News.
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