According to an official statement released on Thursday by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, there is no connection between the current rise in respiratory illnesses in children in China and the instances of pneumonia at AIIMS Delhi.
The Health Ministry refuted the media reports asserting a connection between the two, stating that the story is inaccurate and contains misinformation.
It is made clear that there is absolutely no connection between these seven cases and the recent spike in pediatric respiratory illnesses that have been reported from several countries, including China.
The seven cases, which were discovered during a six-month period (April to September 2023) as part of an ongoing study at AIIMS Delhi, are not alarming,” the ministry stated.
The Ministry further stated that as of January 2023, no Mycoplasma pneumonia has been found in any of the 611 samples tested at the Department of Microbiology, AIIMS Delhi, as part of the ICMR’s multiple respiratory pathogen surveillance. The majority of these cases, or approximately 95% of them, involved severe acute respiratory illness (SARI), which was detected by real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR).
The most frequent bacterial cause of community-acquired pneumonia is Mycoplasma pneumonia. It is the cause of between 15 and 30 percent of these infections. No region of India has reported experiencing such a spike, according to the Health Ministry.
The Union Health Ministry stated that it regularly monitors the situation and is in constant communication with the state’s health authorities.
