Vaccines in Development to Protect Against Dengue Fever | Health | EnglishPosted: December 15, 2011
Scott Halstead, senior advisor to the Dengue Vaccine Initiative, an international consortium of medical research groups, said that fluid treatments for the disease have reduced mortality from the most severe form of the illness. But Halstead added that the rainy season in many parts of the tropics and subtropics – when Dengue-carrying mosquitoes are breeding and biting – is still a time of special anxiety because there is no specific medication or cure for Dengue fever:
“While the mortality rate, in reality, is relatively low because of the availability of good hospital treatment, this is almost unlike any other major infectious disease,” said Halstead.
In its worst form, Dengue fever, also known as “breakbone fever,” can cause severe internal bleeding, circulatory failure, shock, coma and death.