Ontario on high alert after reports of inflammatory illness that may be related to coronavirus

The illness is similar to Kawasaki Syndrome which is a serious and rare inflammatory disease, say health officials. Some of the symptoms are abdominal pain, fever, vomiting and diarrhea, nausea and a rash.

After consulting Dr. David Williams, Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, the government will be updating the coronavirus case definition—adding that children can sometimes see symptoms of multisystem inflammatory vasculitis.

In a statement on Wednesday, Health Minister Christine Elliott said, “This will support clinicians in making clinical assessments of patients who may have symptoms, including some of the most vulnerable of patients, children.”

“Recent reports in Canada and internationally indicate that there may be an increase in multisystem inflammatory vasculitis, a rare but serious multisystem inflammatory illness that impacts children who have been diagnosed with COVID-19.”

Elliot noted that recent Canadian data shows that most coronavirus infections are fairly mild in children and don’t often require hospitalization. There have been no reported child deaths in the country and people below 19-years-old only account for five percent of cases.

Dr. Jeremy Friedman, the Associate pediatrician-in-chief for The Hospital for Sick Children said that staff are on “high alert” when it comes to inflammatory illness reports.

"It certainly is highly suspicious that it seems to be related to the COVID-19 pandemic and obviously that’s going to put us on high alert," Friedman noted.

He added that he knows that kids are “presenting quite sick” with an illness that shares similarities with Kawasaki Syndrome.

"Based on what we’ve heard from European countries, from the U.S. and now from Montreal, it would come as a big surprise to me if we don’t see a start to see a few cases over the next few weeks.”