Covid-19 Management

Covid-19 Management

Covid-19 Management – Covid-19 is no longer a new buzz in the world as of today, most of us have been affected by it; in one way or the other. We have been hearing of this term since November 2019 when the entire world was getting ready to welcome 2020 as a magical year to come and we were ending a decade of digital era with new discoveries in technology, artificial intelligence and IoT etc. No one believed that the upcoming year will turn their lives upside-down and bring the healthcare industry on top of the world. No one had it in their remote thought that their fast moving life will ever have a “full stop” with a new word called #lockdown. Also, it will change the way we work, live, behave and the way we look up to things around us including our relationships.

We can still recall the speech of our prime minister when he announced the slogan of the year “stay home, stay safe”. We as people when started enjoying this #newnormal and the world politics started blaming each other, at the same time our healthcare research centers turned into war-rooms. The healthcare authorities like WHO started looking for remedies and solutions to the upcoming challenges. The entire world started looking forward to vaccines so as to get back to their normal life because this #newnormal was badly affecting our economy and our mental health. Besides all this #covid19 also opened the doors for new opportunities towards the education sector, alternative healthcare therapies and possibilities of a new business roadmap for the world economy. 

Exactly after almost one year India received its first lot of Covid Vaccines during January 2021 called #covishield and #covaxin as a new hope of light for all of us. However, a huge amount of people were not sure about its effectiveness and the side effects as a result very few people went for vaccination because they had already seen that the lockdown, “#taali bajao, #diya jalao and #thali bajao” kind of campaigns did not help them, then who knows if this injection is going to help or not. But as the nation got hit with the second wave during april-may 2021 it pushed us into a panic situation and people found no other option but to get vaccinated themselves as a safeguard against covid outbreak and this new variant was called #Delta.

The Delta variant is a variant of concern classified by WHO on May 11, 2021 and is currently the most dominant variant.  WHO said that the Delta spreads more easily than earlier strains of the virus and is responsible for more cases and deaths worldwide. This outbreak really threatened the nation and we lost many near and dear ones around us during this period. The main reason behind it was that people took it lightly but due to its low incubation period this mutant virus was quick enough to attack our lungs and increased the mortality rate in hospitals. From here on people started taking following WHO instructions more seriously: 

To protect yourself and others from COVID-19 variants:

• Keep a distance of at least 1 meter from others
• Wear a well-fitted mask over your mouth and nose
• Open windows
• Cough or sneeze into a bent elbow or tissue
• Clean your hands frequently
• Get vaccinated, as soon as it is your turn

Covid-19 Management

This period also gave birth to the use of steroids and potent antiviral drugs like Remdesivir, Favipiravir, Ivermectin and Molnuperavir etc. Many of these were new and are to be administered under hospitalization only however Moluperavir being an oral antiviral drug which is considered to be the most effective against the latest COVID-19 variants called Omicron. 

Conclusion:

There is lot of information available on internet and WHO official website but here are our findings other than the above common instructions

• As soon as you feel you have any covid symptoms, get yourself tested.
• Without waiting for the RT-PCR report, get yourself isolated. 
• Incase you are positive immediately get in touch with your doctor and start the required medication considering the fact “early you start, the better you are”
• Keep a check on your symptoms if you feel your O2 saturation falling below 92% or you are having fever even after the 3rd or 4th day then do not wait but rush to the hospital for further investigation. 
• There are few simple tests which one can get conducted during home isolation to monitor their internal health like CRP (C-Reactive Protein, Serum – Quantitative) . If it’s increasing every day then you seriously need to see your doctor. 
• However, as per the current home isolation guidelines in India if you are below 60 years of age and you do not have any critical disease or an immunocompromised condition and also, you are not having any fever or any Covid19 symptom after the 4th day of isolation then you can stay in isolation for 7 days and join back without getting a repeat RT-PCR test done. 

Covid-19 Management