UP Man Dies After Covid-19 Shot, CMO Says Death Due to Heart Ailment

LUCKNOW: In the second such case in Uttar Pradesh, a 55-year-old man died hours after being administered the coronavirus vaccine in Umaria township of Pilibhit district, though the Chief Minister’s Office on Friday attributed it to a heart ailment citing the autopsy report.

Pratap Ram, a Class IV employee of the Child Welfare and Nutrition department, was given vaccine at the Mahila hospital on Thursday morning.

Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Seema Agarwal said the deceased man had a heart ailment and the post-mortem conducted in the early hours on Friday mentioned the disease as the cause of death.

According to his family members, Pratap Ram had undergone a heart surgery in 2007 and a stent was implanted. But, since then he did not have any problem.

Citing the autopsy report, the CMO said his heart was also found to be enlarged. He was getting treatment for the heart ailment in Bareilly, the CMO said.

The statements of the family members and the autopsy report have been sent to the district magistrate, the CMO said. According to the district administration, Pratap Ram, a resident of Kimta Gangolihat village of Uttarakhand’s Pithoragarh district, had been working here for a long time and was posted in the Child Welfare and Nutrition department, Umaria for the past six years.

He was given the vaccine shot on Thursday morning around 11.35 am. His mobile phone has an SMS in this regard. He was taken ill around 5 pm and passed away before his family members and neighbours could arrange medical attention.

Last week, a 46-year-old health worker died in Uttar Pradesh’s Moradabad district a day after receiving the coronavirus vaccination, with the autopsy report attributing the death to ‘cardio-pulmonary disease’.

The family of Mahipal, who was working as a ward boy in the state-run Deen Dayal Upadhaya Hospital, said he was not suffering from any ailment other than fever and cough, and blamed his death on the vaccination.

But the UP government said the man died due to septicemic shock and cardiac arrest and the death was not related to the COVID-19 vaccination.