High viral load can cause death in young patients: Experts

Chennai

Though State Health Department officials have been saying that age and comorbidities can lead to death, as many as 20 persons who died in the State during the same period were less than 40 years of age.

Public health experts say that trends in COVID deaths are changing and even younger population is at risk. At least 18 per cent of the people who did not have any comorbidities have died in past one week.

“Patients who do not have comorbid conditions and also do not show severe symptoms sometimes die, mainly because of higher viral load and associated complications. Heavy viral load leads to sudden collapse of a patient and death within 5-10 minutes,” said Dr Sivakumar, chief of medicine at Villupuram Government Medical College and Hospital and a member of the expert committee.

He added that excessive viral load leads to pneumonia and affects the oxygen-carrying capacity in the blood that causes silent hypoxia. “The patient might look normal but oxygen levels in the blood reduce drastically, which leads to sudden death. Viral load affects the inflammatory cells causing overreaction and death ultimately,” added Dr Sivakumar.

Doctors at government hospitals in the State say that many patients who are as young as 20-30 years of age are vulnerable and become critical without any severe symptoms of COVID-19. In the past week, the youngest patient to die was 22 years old from Vellore and did not have any severe symptoms.

“A fair observation suggests that the health condition of the patients with comorbidities and other complications deteriorates over time and they die due to complications. However, the younger population do not even show many symptoms and thus their recovery is not very significantly indicative unless oxygen levels are monitored,” said another senior doctor at a government hospital in the State.

When contacted, a senior official from the Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine said that the number of cases of patients with comorbid conditions is comparatively higher and treatment is being continued for all as per protocol.