Q: My 9 years old daughter is on her 10th day of penicillin treatment for Streptococcus. Though she says she feels fine now, she only eats about half of what she used to eat earlier. She has also lost 2 kg weight. She hardly plays after returning from the school now. When we talk to her about it, she says she’s just tired. When would she recover from Streptococcus infection?

A:It appears from you description that your daughter had a sore throat with Streptococcus. I believe this germ was identified on throat culture and also the microbiology lab was able to identify the type of Streptococcus. It is not unusual to behave like your daughter is behaving after any severe illness. She would recover with time. Make sure that you check her throat status on follow up i.e. the throat swab culture has become negative, as streptococcoal infections sometimes may have systemic manifestations which may appear after the throat infection has cleared. Give her healthy nutritious diet with lot of liquids, it will help her recover faster.