THE MOST SEVERE CORONA WAVE YET! More and more children with serious double pneumonia, with CT SCORE at 18 out of 25!

"This wave has the most severe clinical presentations, and there's a higher incidence of bilateral pneumonia, requiring oxygen therapy as well. Those children are healthy, without comorbidities," Dr Olivera Ostojić, Chief Physician of the Children's Clinic at the Dragiša Mišović Medical Centre, said for Kurir welcoming the Kurir reporters at the entrance of this children's Covid hospital.

There were 27 children in hospital beds, ranging from 20 days to 17 years old.

"We've had serious pneumonias in the past week. In the last 24 hours we've admitted patients from both Belgrade and the rest of the country – four children with serious bilateral pneumonias, which have high chest CT scores of 14 or 18 out of 25. These are children of 10, 11, 14 years of age, young teenagers. So far, they've been on six litres of oxygen at most. Of course, those who could have taken the jab didn't, and they've come from school environments. Previously they didn't have any illnesses, except for one child, who has an endocrinological problem," Dr Ostojić recounted.

Babies are still faring well, with clinical presentations ranging from minor to moderate.

"They come in with a high fever and recover fairly fast, so babies remain the strongest link in paediatrics," Dr Ostojić said, adding that there had been an uptick in the number of children at the triage station, standing at 30 over the weekend.

Dr Ostojić also urged that vaccinating children aged 12 and more has been approved and that it is recommended by both immunologists and epidemiologists, as well as the Association of Paediatricians, because vaccines are safe and efficient. Just how efficient they can be we learned from a father, accommodated here as accompaniment for his 11-year-old son. The boy, who was in his own world – his earphones in and his cell phone in hand – was on three litres of oxygen.

"He's great now. A couple of nights ago, I thought we were in for it. Nothing could bring his temperature down, he couldn't stop coughing, and couldn't breathe in. Now that that's behind us, everything else will be easy. To be honest, I didn't think corona could touch us until this happened," the dad from Belgrade said. His wife had fallen ill, but he had taken the vaccine and was still negative. He added, smiling:

"If I'm negative when I get out of here, I've jumped over the final level of the game. Thank you to the vaccine."

"He greets us with music every morning," nurse Mira Stjepanović said, laughing, as she took us around the hospital.

"Well, we gotta bring some joy and happy sounds to our day," the dad said and thanked "all the wonderful people of this hospital."

At the far end of the same floor of this building, erected by Queen Marija – another dad with his little boy. The kid was also 11, and was on oxygen and his cell phone. Their mom was ill too, except that they were from Novi Pazar. He was admitted to Mišović MC running a high fever that would not go down. Now he was much much better.

The youngest patient was only 20 days old. His mom, Marina Lekić from Novi Beograd, told us that her younger daughter had brought the virus to her brother.

"She was running a bit of a fever and had a cough, so we didn’t suspect it was corona until he too developed a fever. It went down after three days in the hospital, he's OK now," Marina said as she baby-talked gently to her little darling by the crib.

Gordana Pekarić from Obrenovac was there too, with her little boy. In their house, corona started from her husband.

"It's been six days, and we expect to be discharged. He's turning two months old on Thursday, and I hope it won't be here," Gordana said. Like her husband, she had not taken the vaccine, but because of her pregnancy:

"We've still fared pretty well with this corona business, our older son is still OK. But after all this, we're definitely getting the jab."

One floor up – teenagers. It was a close call with an eighth grader from Jagodina. Now, she put a medical cap on the oxygen tank. You could breathe.

"It was pneumonia, I was really scared. Now I'm much much better," the girl said, smiling.

Her fellow home towner, 17 years of age, was saying good-bye to his roommate from Belgrade in another hospital room. His bags were all packed up.

"He came here as soon as he got infected and now, after seven days, he's going home. I've been here for seven days too, but I don't know when I'll be going home. While they were taking me from one doctor to the next back in Jagodina, I got double pneumonia," the Jagodina boy told us.

Three high-schoolers from Belgrade were sharing a hospital room. Two of them had also been here for seven days. They were cheerful.

"We're feeling better, so it's easier to get through the day – we chat, we're on our phones… All of my friends got infected at school, and I got the short end of the stick," the teenager said.

"Let me tell you, as soon as I get back on my feet and get better, I'll be off to take the vaccine. I never thought I'd have something like this happen to me," the other one added.

The third one could not even lift her head and was feeling awful. She had just lain down. On her nightstand – the self-portrait of the girl who went home after lying in that bed. With the mask and everything.

As we were leaving, we could hear the crying of a one and a half-year-old boy in the X-ray room.

"Everyone out, stay away!" the technician hollered.

Then there was a flash, and a pair of tiny lungs could be seen on the monitor.

EYE CRUST AS THE FIRST SYMPTOM

Mademoiselle, as the staff called her, was there too. Only two months old, she was the clinic's darling.

"I infected my baby, and I was infected by my mother, who came to help me out. She is vaccinated and hasn’t had any symptoms. She's had it easy because she got vaccinated. We noticed that my baby had a bit of eye crust, and many people laughed at us, saying that this had nothing to do with the coronavirus, but it was the first symptom, actually. After three days, she developed a fever, and we knew what was going on," her mom, J.K. from Belgrade, recounted.

(Kurir.rs/Jelena S. Spasić)