Cholera Case in DR, should tourists be concerned?

According to this article, “Cholera strikes fear in Dominican Republic, tourists reassured”,  the first case of cholera has shown itself in Dominican Republic.  A 32-year-old Haitian construction worker who returned to the Dominican Republic from a visit to his homeland was infected with Cholera.  Although it is the country’s first case, they are still encouraging tourists to come and not be afraid.  Their reasons being that it’s only one case and that they will be keeping an eye out for more.  According to the Dr. Eugene Gangarosa, its the perfect time to travel.  Tourists are usually sanitary and the country will be more watchful for the disease.  There will be tests done and its recommended that tourists have some health insurance and to check their health prior to traveling.  I personally would be concerned if I were to travel to Dominican Republic and I learned that there is one case of cholera.  If it were me I wouldn’t go because Haiti is next door and I would be worry about it spreading, despite what the article says.

Here is the link to the article:

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-11-17/travel/dominican.republic.cholera.sidebar_1_dominican-republic-cholera-outbreak-cholera-case?_s=PM:TRAVEL

Mugabe’s Cholera in Zimbabwe article responce

             Another article I read on Cholera is titled Mugabe’s Cholera. This name should ring a bell to those who were in the Call to Action: Crisis in Zimbabwe module. This module was offered in my freshman year, so for those of you who don’t know who he is, Robert Mugabe is both the second and current president of Zimbabwe. He use to be a leader of the liberation movement against the white-minority rule in Zimbabwe, back when it was part of Rhodesia and under British rule. Zimbabwe is a country located in Africa and it use to be one of Africa’s more promising economies. Now it is one of the poorest countries in the world. Only 20% of people are formally employed. The country has the lowest life expectancy age; age 34 for women and 37 for men. Zimbabwe also has one of the highest HIV rates. Health, education and food productions have collapsed. Mugabe’s government have played a major role in the nation’s collapse, he has been the ruler for about 30 or more years.

            In this article, Mugabe is blaming the cholera epidemic in Zimbabwe on Western Colonialism. Yet the cholera epidemic is actually a direct result of the collapse of public services, including the water and sewer systems that Mugabe wrested from city councils. In the last decade Mugabe has been responsible for destroying Zimbabwe through corruption, the assault on private property and the maniacal printing of money. Mugabe stills continues to pint the finger to the “white people” for everything, even after Zimbabwe’s independence from white minority rule.Mugabe continues to deny responsibility for the cholera outbreak and for the nation’s collapse. The cholera epidemic and famine in Zimbabwe have forced many to cross the Limpopo River in order to escape. This is sad. It shows how one person’s greed and power can cause innocent lives to suffer. In poor nations like Zimbabwe and Haiti, where the government is either bad or unstable, a disease like cholera can have a huge toll on the nation.

The link to the article is this:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/12/mugabes_cholera.html

Haiti Cholera epidemic caused by weather? or something else?

My group’s disease is Cholera, therefore I decided to look up articles on the disease. I came across one article on SciDev.Net titled Haiti Cholera epidemic caused by weather, says scientists. In this article, it states that weather conditions may be the actual trigger for Haiti’s cholera epidemic. It is believed that climate changes caused by La Niña, and Haiti’s earthquake are two main causes for the cholera outbreak. But apparently, people believe that Cholera was brought over by UN soldiers from Nepal. Cholera is currently an endemic in Nepal and these UN soldiers were stationed near the Artibonite River, where the outbreak first started. Cholera is caused by a bacterium known as Vibrio Cholerae, which forms in contaminated water. It can also spread when feces from an infected person gets into water that will later be consumed by people. Although scientists seem to be blaming weather conditions, people are still arguing that the cause may have been the UN Nepal soldiers instead.

The link to the article is this:

http://www.scidev.net/en/news/haiti-s-cholera-epidemic-caused-by-weather-say-scientists.html

Odine’s Curse

About 1 out of 200,000 live/are born with Ondine’s Curse. In 2006, there were about 200 cases of people with this condition. In most cases apnea occurred during their sleep, but a few patients apnea happened while they were awake. Ondine’s Curse (Undine’s Curse) also known as Congenital Central hyperventilation Syndrome (CCHS) or primary Alveolar hyperventilation is a respiratory disorder that can become severe without treatment. People with Ondine’s curse die of respiratory fail during their sleep. People with CCHS get it at birth, or develop it from trauma/drama to the brainstem. The diagnosis can be delayed due to the lack of awareness in the medical community, particularly in milder cases. This extremely rare form of central sleep apnea involves an airborne failure of control of breathing. Anyone can have this disease, it’s not determined based on your gender, or ethnicity.

Ondine’s Curse was fist seen by Severinghaus and Mitchell in 3 patients which were about to receive surgery in the upper cervical spinal cord and brainstem. Its name (Ondine’s Curse)  is a reference to the myth of Ondine, a water nymph who had an unfaithful mortal lover. He swore to her that his “every waking breath would be a testimony of [his] love”, and upon witnessing his adultery, she cursed that if he should fall asleep, he would forget to breathe. Eventually, he fell asleep from sheer exhaustion, and his breathing stopped.

Some symptoms of Ondine’s Curse are:

Night apnea, Respiratory arrests during sleep, & Shallow Breathing 

Brain Damage

Nocturnal hyperventilation

Hypoxemia

Hypercapnia

Acidosis

Dysphagia

Hirschsprung disease

Neuroblastoma

Androgen insensitivity syndrome

If you think you may have some difficult determining the gender of a person, wait until you hear about this disease. People affected with this syndrome are girls who are pretty, too feminine looking, but once reaching puberty, they don’t have a menstrual cycle.

Externally they are women. They have breasts, a soft voice, and no body hair. However they have XY gene which are male genes!

Genetically they are males but, their appearance is of a female. What happens is that while they were developing in the utherus of their mother, their body was not responsive to testosterone, and they remained that way of a female. So their testicles shrunk and no penis developed because testosterone is necessary to their development. They have no female genital tract. Obviously they cannot have children( because they are males!) This can cause some seroius psychological issues!

Botfly Larvae: The Deadly Parasites that live in your skin

It’s summer time and very hot and humid. Mosquitos are everywhere and there isn’t enough spray to keep them away. One lands on your skin and bites you before you could kill it. Did you know where that mosquito had been before it landed on your skin and bit you? You do not want to know!

A common fly more prevalent in Mexico and South America called the botfly, uses mosquitoes to reproduce it’s young. The botlfy highjacks a mosquito in mid-flight. While still flying the botfly glues its eggs onto the mosquitos body. When the mosquito lands on a person or another animal the body heat melts the glue around the eggs. As the mosquito begins to suck the blood from the host, the eggs crawl into the host’s body.

For six weeks the worms grow and feast upon the host. The injury occurs when the animal or the human notices the bump from the growing worm underneath their skin. Removing the botfly larvae is painful and difficult. The worm just doesn’t want to leave! The hard tifts on the backs of the maggots make it impossible for the host to remove them without surgical procedures.

However without the removal of the larvae, the host can become very sick with infecction, even a small fragment of the larvae can cause an infection. Therefore, the whole maggot must be removed.

Before the removal of the botfly, the host must suffocate the larvae by putting nail polish, vaseline, or a band-aid over the hole in the skin. If the host does not detect that botfly larvae is growing inside of them, after a couple of weeks the larvae will eat through soft tissue and make their way to the muscle tissue.

Eventually the botfly larvae will get too big to grow under the skin, so they will eat their way out of the flesh amd fall onto the ground, and becomes a botfly, and the life

cycle continues.

Chickenpox

Article from Kidshealth.org

It’s caused by the varicella-zoster virus (VZV). people have come up with a vaccined for chicekn pox, preventing people from getting it later on in their life. Chickenpox is more common in children, but if you get chickenpox as an adult, it will  be more severe and turn into shingles.

Symptoms:

• red, itchy skin rashes that spreads
• rashes then turn into blisters that look like pimples
• fever
• abdominal pain
• sore throat
• headache
• sick feelings

It’s better to have this disease when you’re young rather than getting it as an adult, because if you do it will be worse. Since the Chickenpox is infectious, it is better to stay away from other people. You don’t want others to be infected. If a pregnant woman has Chickenpox, the baby will come out with birth defects! The pregnant lady will also have many health problems.

Kids like to pick and scratch at their blisters. So their rashes may get infected, leading to even more complications. But the doctor does have antibiotics for that.

http://kidshealth.org/parent/infections/skin/chicken_pox.html#

Malaria!

Malaria is actually kind of scary. Mosquitoes are everywhere, especially during the summer, and I don’t to be bitten by any containing diseases.

It is caused by the organism Plasmodium. There is many species of Plasmodium, but only a few affect humans. it spreads through mosquitoes, who then infect people. Sporozoites are formed in the mosquito, and then travel into the red blood cells of a human after being bitten. Blood cells then start to burst, which can cause anemia in humans. Anemia can lead to hair loss!! As well as dizziness. 

Some symptoms of Malaria are:

• Fever
• Chills
• Headache
• Fatigue
• Nausea
• Vomiting

Malaria can occur in areas near the equator, where it’s warmer. people can prevent malaria by only using a Mosquito Net over your bed. As well as putting screens in your windows. anything to keep mosquitoes out of your house.

Malaria is dangerous for babies!

http://www.who.int/topics/malaria/en/

http://www.malarianomore.org/

“Last week, a median of 41 people died in Haiti every day”

Lady showing symptoms of having Cholera 😦
I honestly feel really bad for all these people in Haiti, every time I open an article about cholera it shows someone who looks like is suffering a lot. But what can I expect cholera is a deadly disease. Cholera is caused by a bacteria alled Vibrio cholerae that causes water diarrhea which leads to dehydration and death. Cholera has now spread throughout every part of Haiti, and according to the article is spreading to the Dominican Republic. That honestly scares me, Cholera seems like it can be spread really quickly and I fear for all these people. “Last week, a median of 41 people died in Haiti every day” Wow, 41 people everyday dying, every single day?  I just wanted to share that because it’s honestly just tragic. It’s sad to know that for the last few weeks so many people have died and now that its spreading to Dominican Republic scares me even more, seems like theres more deaths to come. I just hope that this would come to a end.

http://www.latimes.com/health/boostershots/la-heb-cholera-haiti-20101208,2,2207614.story

Kawasaki Disease

Innocent children under the age of five get this. The first phase can last up to 2 weeks. Children who aren’t treated within the first 2 weeks can die. The cause of this disease is unknown. The first phase involves a fever of over 105 degrees fahrenheit. According to http://kidshealth.org symptoms of Kawasaki disease are:

• severe redness in the eyes
• a rash on the stomach, chest, and genitals
• red, dry, cracked lips
• swollen tongue with a white coating and big red bumps
• sore, irritated throat
• swollen palms of the hands and soles of the feet with a purple-red color
• swollen lymph nodes

Many kids who get this disease and are treated right away are able to get rid of the disease in 2 days, others gain heart problems or die.