First COVID-19 deaths of minors registered in Mexico

As of May 21 , health authorities informed that 23 children have died from coronavirus in Mexico.

Christian Skoog

, UNICEF’S delegate in Mexico, informed that 23 children have died from coronavirus in the country and that there are 1,065 cases among that sector of the population. He stressed that the pandemic will affect minors in different ways such as in poverty levels and violence that will soar in the country.

Ricardo Bucio Mújica

, executive secretary of the National System for the Comprehensive Protection of Girls, Boys, and Teenagers (Sipinna) added that “the challenge for children in Mexico is not the pandemic but the invisibility” that surrounds them.

“Children and teenagers are that 30% of the population that we don’t see; the matters related to them are not visible to the government or the industry; we need to flatten the curve of their invisibility ,” he expressed.

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Cristian Roberto Morales

, the Pan American Health Organization ’s delegate in Mexico, asserted that “the crisis after the pandemic affects and will keep affecting our children” so he urged the federal government to attend to their needs.

Alert for Kawasaki symptoms

For his part, Juan Francisco Galán Herrera , coordinator of High Specialty Regional Hospitals , warned that some symptoms of Kawasaki disease can show in minors infected with COVID-19 although it is “extremely rare” and it does not put their lives at risk.

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Galán Herrera said that the symptoms are not directly related to COVID-19, they are the body’s reaction to the virus . Hence, children can contract COVID-19 but it is less common among then due to the resistance their antibodies have acquired from other pathogens.

He asserted that the children population that has arrived at hospitals fighting COVID-19 is very low but, among them, most cases are boys or have a chronic disease , and only the minority of cases need intubation.

Miriam Veras Godoy

, director of the National Center for Children and Teenager Health (CENSIA) , mentioned that some alarming symptoms among minors include a runny nose, crying, sunken ribs, and a purplish color near the mouth, as well as fever.

Lastly, she urged the population to vaccinate their children despite the pandemic and to follow all preventive measures issued by the Health Ministry.

In the daily news conference about the situation of the coronavirus pandemic in Mexico, López-Gatell reported that, as of May 21, there were 59,567 COVID-19 cases and 6,510 deaths in the country.

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