Amid the chaos of the ongoing Coronavirus outbreak, health experts have warned that adults with underlying conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory disease, and cancer are at highest risk for novel Coronavirus.
In India, where prevalence of hypertension is as high as 30 percent, physicians agree that there is a need for caution.
“People with hypertension are indeed at the higher risk of catching the Coronavirus (COVID-19),” said Dr Yash Paul Sharma, Professor and Head, Department of Cardiology, PGIMER.
Highlighting the data from a global research, Dr Sharma noted that Covid-19 patients with hypertension had fatality rate of 8.4 percent to 13.2 percent in those with cardiovascular disease, 9.2 percent with diabetes, 8 percent with chronic respiratory disease and 7.6 percent with cancer.
World Health Organisation (WHO) and Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have issued special warnings to safeguard those with chronic health conditions.
Also, a recent report in the China Daily stated that 50 percent of the 170 patients, who died in Wuhan in January, had hypertension or other NCDs (non-communicable diseases). Although such claims are yet to be clinically substantiated, a WHO-China joint mission on the COVID 19 outbreak has revealed similar findings. Top doctors from Wuhan, the ground zero of COVID-19 have also corroborated that almost 50 percent of those dying from the disease were hypertensive, said health experts.
With at least 35.7 percent people in Punjab suffering from raised blood pressure and a large majority unaware of their condition, screening and precautions to safeguard from the ongoing epidemic is more urgent than ever, the health experts say.
In Chandigarh, as many as 23.6 per cent of persons in the age group above 30 years screened under National Programme for Prevention and Control of Cancer Diabetes, Cardiovascular Diseases and Stroke (NPCDCS) were diagnosed with hypertension, while the number of patients diagnosed for diabetes was 16.5 per cent in a study conducted by UT Health Department in 2018.
Apart from this, a study by the Department of Endocrinology, PGIMER last year had indicated that Chandigarh could be the diabetic capital of India with 15 percent incidents of pre-diabetes and 40 percent of diabetes reported in the city.
Dr Sonu Goel, Professor, Department of Community Health and School of Public Health, PGIMER said that India reported its first case of death due to Coronavirus on Thursday.
