Twelve-year-old girl infected with coronavirus dies in Belgium

(Patria) - A twelve-year-old girl from Belgium has died from coronavirus infection. She is the youngest victim of the epidemic in that country.

This news was announced at a press conference by representatives of the Belgian health authorities.

- This is an emotionally difficult moment because it involves a child, and it has disturbed both the medical and scientific communities, said spokesperson Dr. Emmanuel Andre, who was visibly upset. 'We are thinking of her parents and friends. Something like this rarely happens, and we are deeply shaken,' said Andre.

Another spokesperson added that the child had a high fever for three days and tested positive for coronavirus. No other details related to the girl were disclosed.

So far, the youngest victim in Belgium was a thirty-year-old nurse. In total, more than 700 people have died in that country since the beginning of the epidemic. With 12,775 confirmed cases of coronavirus infection, Belgium ranks tenth in the world.

The epidemic has also claimed a young victim in France. It is a 16-year-old girl who died in a children's hospital in Paris.

Deaths among young people infected with coronavirus are rare, but they do occur despite the repeated myth that it mainly affects older people.

A recent study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, with a sample of 2,500 patients, did not find a single case of death among those under 19 years of age, but it did find that all age groups are susceptible to infection with possible serious complications: more than a third of those hospitalized were between 20 and 54 years old.

 

(source Euronews)