Today we feature a repost from from the blog Global Health Policy at NYU-Wagner. Maintained by the students of Karen Grepin’s global health policy course at the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University, today’s contributor writes about dengue in Latin America, as well as including an overview of the seven most common neglected tropical diseases:
Two years ago, my co-worker traveled to Colombia. She was so excited to go and talked about it for weeks. Her plans entailed hiking on a hidden track through the jungle, touring the countryside and having amazing food. The day she was due to come back to work from her vacation, she was a no show. I was informed that she had contracted dengue while in Colombia and was out sick all week. My head was racing with questions: What? How was that even possible? What EXACTLY was dengue? I knew absolutely nothing about this disease, but it sounded worse than anything I could possibly imagine.
Aedes aegypti - vector for dengue fever
My research informed me that dengue is a mosquito borne infection that causes a severe flu-like illness and can potentially lead to deadly complication called dengue hemorrhagic fever. Mosquitoes became a huge concern for me especially because of my impending trip to Dominican Republic. Dengue was on a rise that year and I was prepared to fight that battle with bug repellant. The entire vacation I reeked of bug repellent, but I didn’t get one mosquito bite. Contracting dengue was my biggest fear and it still is. Dengue is officially on my radar!
The seven most common Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) are ascariasis, hookworm, lymphatic filariasis, onchocerciasis, schstosomiasis, trachoma and trichuriasis. I thought dengue sounded scary, but the top seven sounded worse. Click here to continue reading.