On Tuesday, Mayor Bill de Blasio confirmed that 52 New York City children are suffering a COVID-related ailment that city health officials are calling a “multi-system inflammatory syndrome,” with 10 cases pending confirmation.
“It’s sobering, it’s bluntly frightening… it’s essentially something we did not see in the month of March or April, it was not something that the healthcare community saw on their radar, and then in the last week or two we have started seeing something that is very troubling,” said de Blasio during his daily coronavirus press conference.
Out of the 52 children with the syndrome, 25 have tested positive for COVID-19, while among the remaining 27, 22 had anti-bodies suggesting they had contracted the virus at one point and recovered, according to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene..
The condition, which resembles Kawasaki’s Disease, causes fever, rash, reddish colored eyes, swollen lymph nodes, sharp abdominal pain, and inflammation throughout the body that can have serious effects on the heart. So far, one child in the city has died from the syndrome.
More than 100 children across the state are suffering from the inflammatory syndrome.
“This is something that’s just starting, and New York is leading the investigation of the situation,” said Governor Andrew Cuomo in his daily coronavirus press conference on Tuesday.
The majority of the children suffering from the inflammatory syndrome are between the ages of 5 and 14, though some cases appear in young adults as old as 21, the governor added.
De Blasio encouraged parents to call 311 to report their child’s symptoms and be connected to a medical professional if they do not have access to a pediatrician.
This article was originally published in amny.com. To sign up for the Gay City News email newsletter, visit gaycitynews.com/newsletter.
