Julie Alliot French teen coronavirus death. A 16 year old French schoolgirl becomes the youngest known fatality in Europe as France contends with rapid spike of infections & deaths.
A ‘much beloved’ 16-year-old French schoolgirl with no underlying health problems has become the youngest person in Europe to die of COVID-19.
Julie Alliot of Essonne died late Tuesday at Necker children’s hospital in Paris after a ‘violent’ decline from what appeared to be just a ‘slight cough,’ prior to last weekend her family told French media.
Julie’s cough got worse with mucus and on Monday the family went to see a general practitioner.
‘It’s unbearable,’ the girl’s mother Sabine told Agence France-Presse. ‘
‘She just had a mild cough that she tried to cure with syrup, herbs, inhalations.
‘On Saturday, Julie began to be short of breath. She was having a hard time catching her breath. Then come the coughing fits.’
Upon Julie seeing a doctor for the cough — the disease made a ‘violent’ acceleration before her death, her sister, Manon, told Le Parisien.
‘It was there that she was diagnosed with respiratory distress. She had no particular illnesses before this.’ Manon told Le Parisien.
‘From the start, we were told that the virus doesn’t affect young people. We believed it, like everyone else,’
Come Tuesday the teen was rushed to Necker children’s hospital as her condition continued to devolve.
‘Her lungs failed,’ said Manon. ‘The doctors did everything they could but it was impossible to wake her up.’
‘They arrived in full overalls, masks and gloves,’ said Sabine as emergency services rushed the 16 year old to Necker’s. ‘This was another dimension.’
Her family insisted in interviews that Julie had no health conditions that made them fear she was at risk.
‘From the start, we were told that the virus doesn’t affect young people. We believed it, like everyone else,’ her mother told AFP.
Statements which increasingly contradict a spate of recent infections and deaths of young teens/adults and even infant children, principally in the US.
Manon also said her sister’s death proved that we ‘must stop believing that this only affects the elderly.’
‘No one is invincible against this mutant virus,’ she added.
Manon said Julie was ‘bright and much loved’ and ‘loved to dance, sing, and make people laugh.’
Manon agreed to speak to the Parisien newspaper, and to release a photograph of her sister, because she wanted to warn others about the risk of coronavirus to young people.
A schoolfriend said Julie was ‘a very sociable, funny, kind, ambitious girl who was loved by everyone in high school.’
France, which has one of the world’s best health care systems, is facing its severest test ever, and whether it succeeds will say much about the ultimate adequacy of a well-funded, well-equipped and broadly accessible national treatment plan https://t.co/PN05vOfuyn
— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 27, 2020
French resources to be tested as infections and deaths accelerate:
Until now, many have thought that only the old are in danger of dying because of the virus.
The teen is the youngest known to have died in Europe from the spread of the novel coronavirus, according to the Evening Standard.
France’s Director General of Health, Jérôme Salomon, described Alliot’s death as ‘tragic’— and insisted to The Local that such severe cases of COVID-19 in the young are ‘extremely rare.’ Or are they?
Julie’s funeral will take place on Monday in her home town, but with ‘only ten people maximum’ taking part.
As of Friday, France had recorded 29,155 individuals who’d contracted novel coronavirus with 1696 deaths recorded, of which 365 people had been killed by COVID-19 over the previous 24 hours.
Officials now fear the recent spike in infections and deaths could lead to Paris area hospitals being saturated within 48 hours.
‘The epidemic wave that is sweeping France is a wave that is extremely high and it is putting the entire care and health system under tremendous strain,’ prime minister Edouard Philippe told reporters after a video conference between ministers on Friday.
‘The situation will be very difficult in the coming days,’ the official reiterated.
