A Chinese doctor whose skin suddenly turned dark due to coronavirus treatment has appeared in public for the first time since his colour returned to normal.
Dr Yi Fan, 42, has made a full recovery from COVID-19 after contracting the disease while treating patients at a hospital in Wuhan in January.
His abnormal skin tone was caused by an antibiotic drug he had taken during intensive care, a spokesperson previously said.
Dr Yi Fan is pictured lying in a hospital bed with dark skin (left) earlier this year after getting COVID-19. New footage shows him speaking to media with his usual colour (right) on Monday
Dr Yi fell ill shortly after the virus broke out in Wuhan and before the health crisis swept across the world, killing more than one million people so far.
The medic is a cardiologist at Wuhan Central Hospital.
He is a colleague of late COVID-19 whistle-blower Li Wenliang, who was reprimanded by Wuhan police for sounding the alarm of the virus and then died from the disease.
Another of Dr Yi’s co-worker, Dr Hu Weifeng, contracted COVID-19 on the front line on the same day as him.
Dr Hu’s skin also turned dark during the treatment. He died in early June after fighting the virus for nearly five months.
Dr Yi (pictured on the left before falling ill) beat COVID-19 after being hooked to a life-support machine for 39 days. He is seen (right) after being revived in a clip from Beijing Satellite TV
Pictures presented at a press conference shows Dr Yi Fan on May 9 (left) and on April 6 (right)
Dr Yi showed up in Wuhan’s Taikang Tongji Hospital on Monday after resting at home for more than five months.
In a video released by Hubei Today, the medic looked like his old self, was in good spirits and did not wear a face mask.
He was there to thank a doctor who had helped save his life and happened to be in Wuhan yesterday.
The clip shows Dr Yi saying ‘thank you’ to Wang Chen, an academician specialising in respiratory diseases and critical care. He also gave Mr Wang a bouquet.
‘Academician Wang is my saviour. I need to thank him for sure,’ Dr Yi told journalists at the scene.
Dr Yi appeared in public for the first time yesterday to thank a doctor who had helped save him (pictured). ‘Academician Wang is my saviour. I need to thank him for sure,’ Dr Yi told journalists
Previous footage released by Beijing TV Station shows Dr Yi and his colleague Dr Hu lying in their sickbeds with their dark skin on April 6 in Wuhan’s Tongji Hospital.
Prof Duan Jun, the deputy director of the Department of Critical Care Medicine at China-Japan Friendship Hospital, said the medical team had given Dr Yi and Dr Hu Polymyxin B, a last-resort antibiotic.
He said the drug had caused hyper-pigmentation in the doctors’ bodies, but the condition would slowly disappear as they recovered, according to a televised clip of a press briefing on May 9.
Initially, the medical team thought that their abnormal skin colour was caused by hormonal imbalances after the virus had damaged their livers.
Dr Yi told his doctor on April 6 that he was recovering well and his wounds had largely healed
Dr Yi and Dr Hu were both diagnosed on January 18.
The pair were taken first to the Wuhan Pulmonary Hospital and then transferred to Tongji Hospital’s Zhongfa Xincheng branch, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
Dr Yi saw his condition improved after doctors had hooked him to a life-support machine called ECMO for 39 days.
ECMO is a drastic life-support procedure which replaces the function of the heart and lungs by pumping oxygen into the blood outside the body.
Dr Hu Weifeng (pictured on the left before falling ill), a colleague of Dr Yi, also saw his skin changing colour during his COVID-19 treatment. The medic died from COVID-19 in early June
Speaking to CCTV from his hospital bed on April 20, Dr Yi said he had mostly recovered.
He said he could move in bed normally, but was still struggling to walk independently.
Dr Yi confessed that the ordeal of battling the deadly disease had, to a certain degree, traumatised him.
He told a reporter: ‘When I first gained conscious, especially after I got to know about my condition, I felt scared. I had nightmares often.’
He said he was trying to overcome the psychological hurdle. He added doctors often comforted him and had arranged counselling for him.
Dr Yi was discharged by the hospital in early May. It is reported that he has totally recovered from COVID-19 and can now live without assistance.
Source: Daily Mail
