 And Bird Republic continues to get your top voices from across the country. Today on this edition of Lockdown Questions, we have two imminent ENT specialists joining me on the broadcast are Dr. E.V. Raman. He's the ENT and director of Children Airways Center, Manipal Hospital. Dr. Raman, I want to come to you, especially when it comes to cases of children. Yes, go ahead, please. Right. So we've been the silver lining in the whole thing is children don't seem to be affected as much as adults and when they get affected, the severity seems to be much less. Although we have recorded very young children, even a newborn testing positive for COVID, but the outcome, the prognosis, what happens later is much better in children than in adults. As you know, and since the travel history, etc., etc., is much more in the elder age groups and also the people who are immunocompromised, we are seeing lesser number of children having these problems. Right, but are you getting cases at this point where a child is suffering from cough, cold or fever? What is your advice to those parents and in such cases are children given the advice to go in for a COVID-19 test? What are the kind of cases you're receiving? This is what I was coming to. You see what happens in India where we don't have definite referral patterns. Most of the patients having cold, cough, fever, land up with the ENT surgeon, ENT specialist, both adults and children, and children do have many more upper respiratory infections as a general rule. And so they land up and the parents do get very apprehensive. And fortunately for us these days, we also have specialized fever clinics in these hospitals. So anything that is suspicious of COVID, we request them to go there because the testing facilities are to be targeted because we don't have enough resources to test everybody. So clinical examination is done basically and the children are screened in these fever clinics. And of course those suspected cases we do take the swabs and sent it across, which again is not so easily available. It takes a while for the reports to come. So the other aspect is there are some children who come with emergencies. So we get children with foreign bodies in the airway track, which are the genuine emergencies and you have to take care of these children. And when we take them to the theater to remove the foreign bodies, both the anesthetic team, the other caregivers in the theater, all of us because we are most exposed to aerosolized material which comes up from the respiratory tract. And as you know, the viruses are mostly concentrated in the nose, the nasopharynx, that's the part behind the nose, and at the back of the throat. So the potential to infect others is much more. The team also has to take care. So with limited testing facilities, we have to have the suspicion and as per the ICMR, the government guidelines, some of them will have to go for testing. But the period of burden as of now is not much. But as I said, children do get upper respiratory infections more, so we'll have to be on the guard and take care of them. Oh yes, very important word coming in there that the parents have to be on the guard, even when it comes to the kind of symptoms that the children are showing. We'll talk more on that. But our viewers who are beginning to call, our first caller is Vinod. He's calling from Noida. Vinod, what's your question? Actually, my question is not related to, you know, COVID-19, but actually this is related to my throat problem. Actually, it is very long back. Actually, I have taken a medicine. I mean, my fever or cold feel. So I took medicine. All right. All right. We get your question. And Dr. Ido, if you can take that question to also touch upon the point of whether it is advisable to take self-prescribed medicines? No, not at all. This particular symptoms, which you have asked for, this is not very, go ahead. Yes, Dr. Raman, you make your point after which Dr. Singh will come to you. Okay. Okay. So this feeling of some kind of irritation in the throat, constant throat threat sharing, and then foreign body sensation in the throat is not uncommon in patients in general. This could be multiple reasons. It could be just some allergy. It could be due to some acid reflux or it could even be due to some kind of an infection. So whatever the reason is, we need to get more history, examine the patient and treat that person. But to consider all kinds of throat irritation as something leading to COVID, no, definitely not. We need to look for the other symptoms. And these things, generally off the cuff, I can tell you that good hydration, constant sips of water, preventing dryness of the throat, avoiding anything which is acidic, sour, spicy, ice cold, giving a good three hour gap between eating food and lying down, and get your allergies treated, or sometimes you can get what is called as a post nasal drip, which comes from the sinus and drops down the back of the throat and causes irritation. So of course, anti-allergic medication could be used. Having said that, whether we should self-medicate or not is important. See, many of the common garden illnesses do become all right in a week, 10 days time. And at that initial stage, in case you take some over-the-counter medicines, nothing wrong with it. But if you don't improve in the next three to five days, please go and meet, or if you get worse, please go and take a doctor's advice. And what we are doing, if I may add one more point, is now we don't want you to come and crowd the ENT OPDs because we have enough work here. So what our hospital, for example, has done is we've introduced the concept of teleconsultation. So we are taking care of people like you with teleconsultations so that we are still accessible to the large group of people who are very worried about their illness, wondering whether it's COVID or not COVID, including for their children, etc. All right. I believe, Dr. Raman, the next question is coming from for you. Dinesh is calling from Bengaluru. Dinesh, what's your question? Dinesh, if you can just reduce the audio levels of the television screen and then put your question. My name, which is showing in television, can you make it Dinesh Perikal? Yeah. All right, we'll do that, Dinesh. But what's your question first? Are doctors available? Yes. My question is about the vaccine. Yes. What about the vaccine? Vaccine is still a long way off. That would be the ideal panacea at some stage or the other. Yes, Dr. Raman. Go ahead. It's a slightly distant dream at this particular moment. Right now, we need to reduce the disease burden and make sure that we don't have large numbers over a short period of time where the health systems are strained. But the ultimate level would be probably apart from herd immunity, which has been talked about. That means a sufficient amount of the population gets infected. They develop an immunity. But then what we need is what is absolutely vaccine is the solution. And the problem about vaccine is it does go through the procedures where it has to be tried in subjects. Then finally, we'll have to prove the efficacy and finally improve it. So between 12 to 18 months, every day we read in the relay press that the vaccine is around the corner. So I think it's going to take at least 12 to 18 months. If it comes earlier and if I'm proved wrong, I'll be very happy. All right. Also, our next caller from Bengaluru itself, Parth. Parth, if you can take your question, please. Yeah, hi. Can I ask Dr. Raman the question? Because I think I'm treated in hospital only. Dr. Raman, good morning. Hello. Yes, please go ahead. Yeah. Dr. Raman, I am suffering from a rare disease. Hello. I'm suffering from a rare disease and for which my both heart and kidney are affected and I have to take infusions every 15 days. And I do take that in Manipal Hospital also. Now, my question is that being put on running, it creates a lot of cough on throat. Now, the problem is with this COVID going on and we have to go out for some shopping or other. Sometimes you get a fear that have I got COVID or it is just because of running the medicine going on now. And that is something which is a little scary because we have got a little bit of susceptibility regarding the immune system now. So what do you say, sir? Yes. See, anybody who's on with comorbid conditions like you is more susceptible to the COVID infection. And if everybody is taking the right precaution and if you take double the amount of precaution, it would be worthwhile. Meanwhile, what was the medicine that you said you're on? I couldn't get it. I'm on on dranitrile. That is one for my throat. Then there's one ferocious type that is Okay. Okay. Uric acid and for cholesterol. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, yeah. So you just need to be doubly careful or everybody should be careful and you should be careful as anybody else because of your constant visits to hospitals and treatment, your immune system is not as efficacious as others and that's the All right. We have a lot of calls coming in and we are moving slightly faster on this. Anil Sharma is also calling from New Delhi. Anil, what's your question? Doctor, good morning. Actually, from last one week or 10 days, I developed pain in my right ear. And I have no symptoms of throat infection or cough and cold. Nothing is there. And the pain is so much that when I eat something, I feel very difficult. And because of lockdown, I cannot move outside and know if it is working general opi-dori and p-opi-dori. So, can you suggest some medicine so that I can get some relief? Doctor, Raghun, you'd like to take that? Yeah. From what I understand, your pain is there when you are swallowing. Is that right? Pain in the ear is there when you swallow? No, no, no. You have pain? I have pain in general. Okay. Otherwise also. Okay. So, there are multiple reasons for your pain. One could start off from hard wax onwards to infection in the external canal skin to middle ear infection, etc. But since you don't have a cold, maybe it's not a middle ear infection. But if you are having any pain on touching the external ear, then you need to definitely take some kind of a pain reliever. If it doesn't improve, I'm afraid somebody has to see you or you can seek a tele-consultation and they can probably help you out because it's difficult to prescribe medicines on that. If you don't have a cold, maybe just a painkiller. And if you think you have block tears due to wax, you can use some wax dissolve and drops for now.