It has been three and a half years but he still gets nightmares. He feels guilty of not being able to save his mother from the deadly COVID-19. The guilt pangs continue for 23-year-old Yuvraj Singh Mann.
Understandingly so, after his mom was all of 58.
She was among many who succumbed to the virus. And how? “There were no beds even in the military hospital or private facilities either. My mother was kept in the general ward in the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital,” bemoans Yuvraj, whose father was in the Army.
“I could not see my mother. The situation makes you feel helpless. Money was not an issue. It feels the treatment could have been expedited if we had some connections,” he says.
In fact, he had to seek counselling, and he even started smoking. “It is clueless. It is just a distraction,” Yuvraj shrugs.
Yuvraj, albeit, is not alone. Take 34-four-year-old Shweta Shah, who breaks into tears every time she remembers her mother who too fell prey to Covid in its second avatar. “There was nothing we could do for her. We had to depend on a daily phone call that we got from the hospital,” says Shweta, whose mother, 65, was in the makeshift hospital set up near the Gujarat Mineral Development Corporation ground in Ahmedabad.
She had a fall in the bathroom during her stay in the hospital. The Shahs could not do anything even then.
Finally Covid got better of her. Shweta still cannot believe that after they got a call from the hospital that her mother was no more, they also got a call saying that her parameters were improving and she was doing better. This reflected sheer lack of communication on the part of the teams that made calls. “For a while, we were clueless whom to believe,” she says, adding that the life will never be the same again.
The deadly virus not only shattered the families that lost the loved ones but even till date at a time when December 2024 marks five years of first case of Covid being detected in China’s Wuhan, there are people who still need counselling. Moreover, the ones who had battled severe Covid condition have problems with the lungs and even the heart. Cases of thyroiditis are also seen.
Dr. Ajay Jain, consultant pulmonologist in Ahmedabad, tells Vibes of India that most of the patients recovered but some of those who had severe Covid and required ICU set up have fibrosis in the lungs. Fibrosis results in coughing and breathlessness.
He has also been a witness to how physical and mental bonding among people was affected during Covid times. According to him, a posh housing society in western part of Ahmedabad, wanted to throw away a doctor’s family because they feared that they too would get Covid as the doctor had quarantined himself at home after getting infected. The doctor’s relations with the immediate neighbour continues to remain strained.
Iti Shukla, consultant clinical psychologist at Sterling Hospital, says be it a seven-year-old or a 12-year-old, all were equally affected as during two years it was not possible for them to concentrate during online classes.
Even now, people with anxiety issues come to her for counselling. It was not about students alone, even parents had issues because everything was at a standstill and those who wanted to go abroad could not go, jobs were lost and several businesses were closed, she recalls.
According to her, there were panic attacks and they were really vulnerable. Shukla did several grief counselings as youngsters died. “I used to tell them to take charge of one’s life as Covid was something you cannot change,” she says.
Call it panic resulting due to fear, there are people who go in for radiological tests even before going to the doctor.
Senior consulting pulmonologist Dr. Parthiv Mehta tells Vibes of India, “The flip side of Covid is over diagnosis. Several patients I see have been undergoing radiological tests even before coming to me,” he says.
Commonest thing to happen post-Covid is fibrosis and Dr. Mehta sees patients who ask him if they have got fibrosis. Unlike general perception, that fibrosis is progressive, it isn’t if proper medication is followed.
While the flip side has been over diagnosis, there is a section of population that is now listening to doctors when they recommend annual flu vaccines and/or pneumonia vaccine.
According to him, in certain class of people, even Shingles vaccine, which costs around Rs 19,000 for two shots, is also becoming acceptable.
Ahmedabad-based senior physician Dr. Dipesh Shah recommends annual flu vaccines, especially for those having diabetes, blood pressure and other ailments. They fall in high risk category. These annual shots are also recommended for senior citizens. Flu and pneumonia are also a cause for concern, he says.
After initially seeing people with complaints of asthma and other respiratory issues, this physician has been also seeing cases of thyroid dysfunction. People come with thyroditis that later on results into hyperthyrodism, he says. Covid also adversely affected the blood clotting mechanism of patients, especially in the ones those where the severity was more.
Post-Covid there has been a spike in the number of young persons losing lives due to heart. However last year, doctors at Ahmedabad’s Civil Hospital had categorically claimed that the heart attacks had nothing to do with Covid and/or vaccines.
However, there is one key factor — inflammation — that is missing key in the management of ischemic heart disease. Ahmedabad-based interventional cardiologist Dr. Kamal Sharma tells Vibes of India that in ischemic heart disease (heart attacks) inflammation is one of the key trigger factors apart from cholesterol, diabetes, blood pressure and all the traditional risk factors involved. “Studies show inflammation is responsible for occurrence of various events,” he says.
He explains, “Severe covid, severe the inflammation. For those who having a tendency of getting inflammation, it is not only in the lungs but all across the body and hence higher occurrence of event rates.”
Occurrence of severe Covid, according to him, was more prevalent in people having diabetes and blood pressure and the same is the case with heart disease. So, inflammation is the common interlinking marker that determines and drives events in acute phases and in the longer run. “We need to watch in the longer run. We need to watch for a decade,” he points out.
The interventional cardiologist says severe inflammation can get long term coronary events, with or without Covid. He says inflammation is the link.
According to him, inflammation probably has never been looked into as a missing link in cases of heart attacks, but in severe cases of Covid this angle is being looked into. While these problems are likely continue for at least a couple of years, doctors say the key to remain healthy and fit is exercising, eating healthy food and trying to lead a tension free life.
(Note: Some names have been changed to protect identities)
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