“The short answer is nobody knows,” he says. Ebbing tells USA Today these “COVID Toes” could be a part of an inflammatory response or blood clotting. Lesions on the toes have been observed to disappear following 7-10 days in some patients, while others go on to exhibit more classic symptoms of the virus.ĭr. “Sometimes this might be your first clue that they have COVID-19 when they don’t have any other symptoms.” 2 “This is a manifestation that occurs early on in the disease, meaning you have this first, then you progress,” says Ebbing Lautenbach, M.D., chief of infectious disease at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Medicine. Interestingly, patients with these skin symptoms do not seem to display any other typical symptoms associated with the virus, including shortness of breath, cough and fever, and also tend to test negative early on. “COVID toes,” first noted in March by Italian dermatologists, seems to occur more in pediatric and young adult patients and is characterized by blue or purple lesions appearing on the toes, according to an article from USA Today. These reactions include “dengue fever-like rash,” a “hives-like rash,” livedo reticularis, a “measles-like rash” and pernio located on the extremities (also known as “COVID toes”), according to an article from Yahoo Life. RELATED: Maui Derm shed light on Emerging COVID-19 data The virus can reportedly affect not only the lungs, but other internal organs as well as the senses – and now dermatologists are observing skin reactions in patients with the disease. A new symptom is popping up in COVID-19 patients.