Courtney Nickle
October 30,2009
7:20 p.m
Lassa Fever has been found in the lower hemisphere of China which is odd since the illness has been mostly found in West Africa. The illness affects several of the major organs and can last up to a month. The symptoms that most people in the areas where it is spreading should watch for headache, sore throat, muscle pain, chest pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and coughing. More severe cases you should watch for swelling in the face, fluid in the lungs, bleeding from the mouth, nose, and vagina (for women), seizures, tremors, low blood pressure, and shock. If you do get medical care but have come with the illness already in the serious stage then after recovery you could become deaf but it may come back within a 1 -3 month period. The best way to not catch this is to be as sanitary as possible since the only way of catching this fever is by direct contact with blood, urine, feces, or other bodily secretions of a person with Lassa fever. If you can get to a doctor and have the money to do so there is a treatment for the Lassa fever called Ribavirin; It has been very affective so far in curing people that have come in with this fever.
The only problem with this fever and having it not be spread is that it is being found in the worst parts of West Africa and China where being sanitary is not the first priority. A lot of these people don’t have the necessary tools to be sanitary and clean to not catch this and are problem not even aware on how it is being spread. I think a lot of the diseases that become serious and spread the most are because the people in the areas it starts in do not have the necessary tools to keep from catching it nor to cure it once they know.
http://www.healthmap.org/en
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs179/en/
http://www.google.com/trends?q=Fever
2 comments:
Until now, I had never heard of Lassa Fever but from your summary post I can tell that it can indeed be deadly. As you mentioned, it is a shame that this particular fever hit two of the most unsanitary parts of the world. Although unfortunate, had the fever hit the United States, it may have never become a significant problem due to higher levels of sanitation and health care.
Even though this fever is seen only on the other side of the world. It still holds power to the fact that people really need to be concerned with being sanitary. There is no room to say that something like that could or could not happen over here but either way people need to be sanitary (presence of disease or no disease).
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