22 days, 46 deaths: Thiruvananthapuram zooms past state’s mortality rate

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The mortality rate in the district is now higher than that of the state with 46 deaths officially reported in the district in the last 22 days, including a pregnant woman and her baby.
The district, which had a mortality rate of 0.28% in the first week of August, went above the state’s rate of 0.3% on Thursday when the rate touched 0.43%. The state capital accounted for 28% of deaths recorded in the state in August.
The youngest of the deceased in the district was a 32-year old pregnant woman who died on August 16. There were two lives — the mother and the baby — at stake, and eight departments at Medical College Hospital joined hands to save them, but in vain.
She was 29 weeks’ pregnant and had gestational diabetes mellitus and hypothyroidism. The woman had two miscarriages before and she was diagnosed with bronchopneumonia and severe acute respiratory distress syndrome.
She had to be put on ventilator since her oxygenation status did not improve. With no bystander allowed, the consent was taken over phone for an emergency surgery and it was done in ICU owing to her serious condition. She later developed a renal failure and died two days after the surgery due to multiorgan dysfunction syndrome. “She really fought hard but the condition was so worse and lungs were severely infected. Her death is a reminder to all of us as to how we should take care of vulnerable people in our family and society,” said a medical official associated with the treatment team.
The death of the 32-year-old pregnant woman due to complications arising out of Covid-19 has aggravated the challenges before the health team in preventing mortalities among vulnerable groups, especially women requiring antenatal care.
The health officials said many of the Covid-19 deaths have been in the age group above 60 with a 90-year-old woman from Kalady being the oldest Covid-19 victim in the district.
Twenty deaths that occurred in August so far were categorised as non-Covid deaths and there were many cases where the patient was brought dead and then tested positive. While many deaths have occurred in areas marked under community clusters, Covid deaths were also reported from places with nominal number of cases.
The district has 35 people in ICU and their condition is daily monitored by the health team. “Given the kind of spike, the capital has witnessed in last two months, the mortality rate was bound to increase. Since Thiruvananthapuram has the best healthcare infrastructure in the state and has been picking up positives and isolating infected persons at a faster rate, we have been doing reasonably well in controlling the mortality rate,” a health official said.