Toddler's death prompts call for virus awareness

Doctors working in emergency care for children need to be more aware of a "surge" in a virus following the Covid-19 pandemic, a coroner has said.

Assistant coroner for Essex, Jyoti Gill, has written a prevention of future deaths report after toddler Viviana-Ray Butnaru died of heart inflammation caused by parvovirus in October 2024.

An expert who attended her inquest told the BBC the "lack of normal immunity" after lockdowns could be responsible for the "much higher" number of cases.

Dr Simon Nadel said that - while Viviana-Ray's case was "extremely rare" - hospital staff being unaware of "atypical" symptoms could cause treatment delays.

A lack of awareness could mean a "worse outcome" for patients, he continued.

Nadel said the "most common" kinds of infection caused by parvovirus included slapped cheek syndrome, which causes a rash on the cheeks, rather than the virus moving to the heart and causing myocarditis as it had done in Viviana-Ray's case.

Gill recorded the 14-month-old's cause of death as complications from myocarditis caused by parvovirus, contributed to by bronchiolitis and bronchial pneumonia.

The inquest concluded that the failures in her treatment at Basildon Hospital were "not directly causative to her death".

Gill's report, which was sent to Basildon Hospital (Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust) and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, also identified a lack of local or national guidelines for medical staff in identifying and treating potential heart conditions, and requested improvement in this area.

Nadel said this recommendation could equip doctors with the ability to work out what was going on in cases like Viviana-Ray's, where "atypical" symptoms presented.

Speaking to the BBC on Monday, he said: "Anything that helps paediatricians or emergency medicine doctors look for the unusual - and recognise the unusual presentation of common illnesses - is really important because it's those presentations that often cause delay in diagnosis and therefore a worse outcome for patients."

In a statement released after the inquest last month, Sharon McNally, the chief nursing officer at the NHS trust, said: "Following her tragic sudden death, we carried out a full investigation and have taken action to ensure that our resulting learning can demonstrate improvements in our care."

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