The Health Ministry issued guidelines on prevention and treatment of co-infections of COVID-19 with other seasonal epidemic-prone diseases like seasonal influenza, dengue, malaria, among others.
In order to avoid health risk in people during the coronavirus pandemic, the Ministry of Health on Tuesday issued guidelines on prevention and treatment of co-infections of COVID-19 with other seasonal epidemic-prone diseases like seasonal influenza, dengue, malaria, leptospirosis (rat fever), chikungunya and enteric fever.
The spread of such seasonal epidemic-prone diseases rises at its peak during this time every year. These can co-exist with the current COVID-19 pandemic and can also pose clinical and laboratory diagnostic issues.
The government said that as per the World Health Organisation (WHO) case definition, a COVID case may present with acute onset of fever and cough, or, acute onset of any three or more of the following signs or symptoms: fever, cough, general weakness or fatigue, headache, myalgia, sore throat, coryza, dyspnoea, anorexia, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, altered mental status.
It said that seasonal epidemic-prone diseases like dengue, malaria and the flu may all present as febrile [showing the symptoms of a fever] illness, with symptoms that mimic that of the coronavirus.
"If there is a co-infection, then apart from the febrile illness there may be a constellation of signs and symptoms that may lead to difficulty in diagnosis," the ministry said.
Read the full guidelines here
Approaches to diagnosing co-infection:
The Health Ministry has listed approaches to diagnose suspected co-infection which include, a high index of suspicion for epidemic-prone diseases existing in specific regions during monsoon and post-monsoon seasons.
Bacterial co-infections must also be suspected in moderate or severe cases of COVID-19 not responding to treatment.
Malaria and dengue can coexist with other infections, and thus a diagnosis of either of these does not rule out the possibility of the patient not suffering from COVID-19.
"Similarly, a high index of suspicion of malaria and dengue must be there when a fever case is diagnosed as COVID-19, particularly during the rainy and post rainy season in areas endemic for these diseases," the Ministry added.
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