India’s former first lady recovers from COVID-19 at 93

By Masood Sattar Khan
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

Vimala Sharma, the wife of former President of India, Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma, has successfully fought against deadly Coronavirus pandemic at the age of 93.

She was discharged from the AIIMS Trauma Centre in New Delhi on evening of June 25, two and a half weeks after she had tested positive for COVID-19, the Indian media reported. The 93-year-old is among the oldest to have recovered from the virus in the world. 

According to family sources, her oxygen levels had started dipping on June 5 after which she was tested, and her reports came positive on June 6. 

“To our horror, her report was positive and we immediately rushed her to AIIMS. It came as a shock as she doesn’t go out of the house at all. The first four days, her condition did deteriorate a bit. I know she is 93 but losing her to a virus would have been the worst,” her son Ashutosh Dayal Sharma told The Indian Express. 

While admitted for almost 18 days, she was not put on ventilator support. Her family didn’t lost hope and spoke to her twice during her entire stay. A couple of weeks after the admission, she was tested again and her reports came out negative.

The doctors at AIIMS said that, apart from antibiotics, she was on a high flow nasal cannula, a technique through which a high amount of oxygen can be delivered.