An 8-year-old boy from Jacksonville dies from coronavirus-related syndrome, according to the family

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Friends and family mourn the loss of an eight-year-old Jacksonville girl after she died Saturday morning from a COVID-19-related syndrome.

Deaurra Nealy was a sophomore at Twin Lakes Academy. Her family described her as an affectionate and affectionate girl who was a good student.

“He strove to be great in everything, his grades. He had all 100s and a 95s, and he thought it wasn’t good enough. That’s the kind of person he was, ”said Dearick Nealy, Deaurra’s father. “I wanted to get people up and cheer the room on when she came in. I mean, she’s inspired so many people in such a short time. I just knew she was just a perfect girl.”

According to her father, Deaurra died a few days after the first signs of multisystem inflammatory syndrome, or MIS-C, which is a disease in children that usually follows a coronavirus infection or exposure, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention .

Dearick said tests of her son again showed she was negative for the virus, but also showed she had been infected at some point.

“A perfectly healthy child, with a normal stomach ache and a negative COVID test,” he said. “And then the fever wouldn’t break.”

As MIS-C develops, according to the CDC, parts of the body can become inflamed, including the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes, or gastrointestinal organs.

“Unfortunately, it’s a syndrome that manifests quite strongly when children have it,” said Dr. Jonathan Kantor of the Penn Center for Epidemiology. “Again, it’s believed to be somehow a reaction in the body to some kind of inflammatory reaction, but you don’t understand exactly what’s going on.”

The CDC says of the syndrome: “We don’t know why some children get sick with MIS-C and others don’t. Nor do we know whether children with certain health conditions are more likely to get MIS-C. These are some of the questions the CDC is working on to try to understand. “

“The key message is why it is so important for us to take COVID-19 seriously in all populations,” Kantor said.

Deaurra’s father said he also wants to warn other families, urging everyone to follow safety guidelines.

“Many people are told that COVID-19 does not affect children. And so many people get lazy with simple sanitary measures, such as masks and hand sanitizer, which is simple, ”he said. “It’s to help not pass this on to anyone else.”

The family has started a GoFundMe campaign to help with medical costs.