World Health Organization guidelines state in part that a Covid-19 patient who dies should be documented as a Covid death.
Although many Covid-19 death certificates are handled by physicians, pathologists are listed to determine the cause of death, said Dr Edwin Walong, a pathologist based at Kenyatta National Hospital and a lecturer at the University of Nairobi’s Department of Pathology.
To rule out the thought that one of these comorbidities could be the cause of death and not Covid-19, Dr Amoth explained that most of the deaths documented either had multiple organ failure or were not responding to conventional treatment.
On a death certificate, Dr Walong explained, there are spaces to list an immediate cause of death, as well as the chain of events that led to that final disease or incident.
Therefore, it is safer to assign all Covid-19 positive cases who succumb to Covid deaths,” Opined Dr Walong, adding that this helps inform the public health response taken by the government.
