The Health Ministry is currently verifying four suspected cases of severe acute hepatitis in children whose causes have not yet been determined.
“There are several findings of three to four cases, but we are still verifying them,” the ministry’s spokesperson, Siti Nadia Tarmizi, confirmed here on Thursday afternoon.
The patients are currently undergoing intensive treatment at Jakarta’s Sulianti Saroso Infectious Diseases Hospital, she informed.
The symptoms experienced by the patients include yellow marks on the skin and eyes, acute stomachache, acute diarrhea, vomiting, seizures, and sluggishness.
According to Tarmizi, the patients’ specimens have been sent to the laboratory at the University of Indonesia’s Faculty of Medicine (FKUI) for research purposes.
The investigation into the mysterious hepatitis cases will also delve into the possibility that earlier, three children in Jakarta died due to severe acute hepatitis.
“According to the result of the contact investigation toward the cases, three of them came into the health facility in an advanced stadium/stage, allowing little time for health workers to rescue them,” she explained.
Out of the three patients, the two-year-old had not received a COVID-19 vaccination, the eight-year-old had received one dose of the COVID-19 vaccination and complete hepatitis vaccination, and the 11-year-old had been administered complete COVID-19 and hepatitis vaccinations.
The three patients were COVID-19 negative. Based on the investigation’s result, it was also found that one of them had comorbidities, Tarmizi informed.
The three cases have not yet been categorized as severe hepatitis, but they have been included in the classification pending criteria, she said.
This is because there are laboratory examinations that must be done, especially adenovirus and hepatitis E examinations, that will require 10 to 14 days, she elaborated.
Source: Antara News