Rash Records

Even with vaccinations well underway, the novel coronavirus is likely to be spreading through the human population for some time, perhaps especially amongst children who, as a group, are not yet receiving the jabs. Although the vast majority of SARS-CoV-2-infected children will not develop severe COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, in rare cases a life-threatening complication called multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS) has been described. MIS involves hyperinflammation of multiple organs, typically the heart, lungs, brains, skin and gastrointestinal system, and is accompanied by an array of symptoms including fever, rash, fatigue, and vomiting. Researchers have been documenting the assorted rashes seen with COVID-MIS, finding that, like the one on this child’s back, they often look like coin-sized circles and tend to occur on the trunk and lower body, rarely affecting the face. It’s hoped that publicising these rashes will speed recognition and treatment of this serious condition.

Written by Ruth Williams

Ruth Williams

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Ruth is a freelance science journalist based in the US. She's a regular correspondent for The Scientist, and her work has appeared in The Lancet, Nature, Scientific American Mind, BBC Focus and elsewhere. Twitter @rooph

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• Image from work by Allison M Blatz and colleagues
• Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Pediatrics, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
• Published in Open Forum Infectious Diseases, March 2021