Kolkata: Five major Kolkata labs—some of them stand-alone facilities and some hospital-based—diagnosed 30-odd people with human metapneumovirus (HMPV) in Nov and Dec, ’24. All the patients—three-four adults and the rest children, some as young as three months old—have recovered.
Doctors confirmed there was no unusual surge in HMPV cases as of now, pointing out hospital-based labs with BioFire facility to detect HMPV diagnosed two to three cases on an average every month and stand-alone labs around seven. State health officials have been holding meetings on HMPV, but the govt is yet to issue guidelines for hospitals. Health officials said they were keeping a close watch.
Infectious diseases specialist Yogiraj Ray said HMPV was a benign virus and that there was no need to press the panic button. “If the reports of a surge in China are true, we need to know the genetic variant of the virus first and then the epidemic status. If it is not causing any acute respiratory distress, it should not cause any major healthcare burden,” said Ray, associate professor at IPGMER.
Despite no alert as of now, several hospitals decided to be cautious and started chalking out plans for any uptick in respiratory viral infections. Some have held own internal meetings, while a few have scheduled such discussions in a couple of days. “We had a meeting with our infection control and microbiologist teams on Monday. Our doctors said HMPV was not much of a concern as of now, but we need to be proactive and keep ourselves ready in case of any spike,” said Rupak Barua, MD & CEO, Woodlands Hospital.
Such a meeting has been slated for Wednesday at Ruby General Hospital. “We will hold a discussion with our paediatricians, infectious disease control and critical care teams to discuss the situation. We will review if we need to start certain steps, such as ramping up of tests and fix treatment protocols,” said Subhashis Datta, chief general manager of operations at Ruby General Hospital.
All hospitals confirmed that the few cases they had received on and off were mostly mild and that there was no unusual spike. “We encounter HMPV every year, mostly from Nov. While there is no reason to worry, our PICU team is ready as this virus affects children mostly. We will not ramp up tests unless the govt tells us,” said Sudipta Mitra, CEO, Peerless Hospital. “Our emergency, critical care and pulmonology teams are well-equipped to handle any situation. Covid has strengthened Bengal’s healthcare system,” said Prashant Sharma, MD, Charnock Hospital.
Doctors, however, pointed out that wearing masks did help prevent virus spread. “We are asking patients with respiratory distress to undergo viral PCR tests. If numbers increase, or if an HMPV case is found, we may make testing mandatory before admission,” said Amitabha Saha, director, critical care medicine, Desun Hospital.
