Mosquito Borne Chikungunya Virus can cause Serious Brain Inflammation

Among all the cases, the infection had serious consequences for at least 24 patients, who developed encephalitis as a outcome. The latest study seems to be a bad news for Latin America and the Caribbean with the rate of infection about a million people per year.

The virus only arrived in the Western Hemisphere in December 2013, on St. Martin.

The chikungunya virus can cause fatal brain infection particularly for infants and people over the age of 65, according to a new study. However, in 2014, the first locally transmitted case of the virus was reported in Florida, according to the CDC.

“These numbers are both much higher than the rates of encephalitis in the United States in these age categories, even when you add together all the causes of encephalitis”, lead researcher Dr. Patrick Gérardin from the Central University Hospital in Saint Pierre, Reunion Island said in a press release. The only treatment left for treating the chikungunya infection is fever-reducing mediation. Gérardin advises travellers to take steps to avoid mosquito bites such as wearing long-sleeves, trousers and insect repellent.

For this study, Dr. Gérardin and team looked at an outbreak on Reunion Island that occurred in 2005.

The death rate for those with chikungunya virus-associated encephalitis was 17%.

The overall incidence rate for chikungunya-associated encephalitis was 8.6 cases per 100,000 people, the researchers found.

Although there’s been only once case of chikungunya that originated in the USA experts recommend people traveling to Africa, Asia and the Carribean protect themselves from mosquito bites. They have discovered that it can lead to a serious brain inflammation known as encephalitis far more often than reported previously.

They found that the rate of brain infection from the outbreak was higher than the rate seen in the United States due to West Nile.

The researchers found that 24 people had encephalitis during the outbreak. These included behavioural changes or difficulty thinking and remembering, the researchers said. So far in 2015, more than 621,000 suspected and confirmed cases have been reported throughout the Americas. The incidence rate in infants was 187 per 100,000 children younger than 1 year, and 37 per 100,000 people in people over age 65. VLP vaccines can stimulate immune responses comparable to those resulting from naturally acquired immunity following infection and, because virus is not needed to produce VLP vaccines, they do not need to be prepared in high-level biocontainment facilities.

An estimated 30p-45 per cent of the infected persons with encephalitis had persisting disabilities.

Patients are given IV fluids and medicines to reduce their pain and fever.

Jamaica was hit hard by a chikungunya outbreak a year ago with several deaths linked to the contraction of the disease. Those who develop encephalitis might be treated with steroids to reduce brain swelling, Guliani said.