Shannon Bourret
March 31, 2009
9:37 PM
The US Food and Drug administration has recently approved a vaccine to prevent Japanese encephalitis. The mosquito transmitted virus is usually found in Asia. About 50,000 people are affected each year by the virus and about 15,000 die from it. While the Japanese encephalitis virus is not normally found in the US, there have been a few cases found in people who travel between the US and Asia. The Japanese encephalitis virus can lead to mild symptoms like headache and fever because the membranes that surround the brain are affected. More severe cases, however, start out with flu-like symptoms and then lead to high fever, neck stiffness, brain damage, coma and death. On a positive note though, the virus is not known to be spread from person to person. The newly approved Ixiaro vaccine has reported symptoms of headache, muscle pain, swelling and tenderness at the injection site. This vaccine is produced by Intercell Biomedical in the United Kingdom.
I was pretty surprised by this article! First off because I didn’t even know that this virus even existed!! But, I am glad to hear that a vaccine for this has been approved! For a virus that I did not even know about, that is a pretty high number of people to have died from it, let alone to have been infected by it! It is a bit relieving to know that the virus is not common in the US. On the other hand, it is kind of concerning to find out that there have been some reported cases here, even if it is from people who travel between America and Asia. I was also happy to learn that the Japanese encephalitis virus is not known to be transmitted from person to person.
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