The most serious disease
...symptoms. They are categorized in Acute, Indeterminate, and Chronic. Acute stage occurs only in small percentage of Chagas cases (about 1 % of the cases). Most of people in acute stage don’t need medical attention. The symptoms may cause the swelling of the eyes or the sides of the face, fever, enlarged liver and sometimes loss of appetite and diarrhea. In the indeterminate stage, it was about 8-10 weeks after the infection, patients usually don’t present any symptoms. The last stage which is the chronic stage, which is 10-20 years of infection and this is the most serious and dangerous stage. The symptoms for this stage may include cardiac problem such as enlarged heart and heart failure and severe constipation or swallowing problem. Chagas disease is a disease that has no effective cure but it can be diagnosed by taking a blood test and it can always be prevented. One ways to prevent chagas disease is to avoid sleeping in mud, thatch, use insecticides and beware of infected blood supply because it can be transmitted through blood. The best way to prevent the disease when we are traveling is stay in hotels or any well-constructed facilities where it is not a likely contact reduviid bugs. Chagas disease is a big threat to humans than AIDS, therefore we should always be careful of where we go especially to the South and Central America where the disease is high at risk. Plague Plague, also called “bubonic plague” is an infectious disease caused by bacteria called Yersinia pestis. Originated in Egypt in the year, 541 AD, this disease infected both animals and humans and swept through out the world in the following years. In U.S., Plague occurs most in southwestern states, which include Arizona, Colorado, California and New Mexico. Plague cases also occur in such countries as Africa, Asia and South America. The Plague used to be a deadly disease where there was no cure in the old times and consequently led millions of people to die during the European civilization. At the time the disease was called “the Black Plague” and also known as “the Black Death” and it was spread by infected rodents, fleas, squirrels or mice. During this time, people had high contact with rodents and therefore the disease spread through many of the countries very quickly. The present day status of Plague is not severe as in the old times. During the middle ages, Plague killed millions of people. Event though today there are antibiotics that are effective in fighting against Plague, each year in United States there are 1,000 to 3,000 cases of disease reported by the World Health Organization. In the modern times, Plague is often transmitted by fleas that are carrying plague bacteria. The people who are also at a high risk for this disease are those people who have close contact with wild rodents because there still are places around the world where rodents are infected with plague. Hunters, campers, hikers have to be very careful about entering areas where plague may exist. There are total of three different forms of symptoms of plague. The first symptoms are the bubonic plague, which may result in sudden onset of fever, chills and tender lymph nodes. The second type of symptom is septicemic plague, which may result in fever, chills, shock, and muscle pain. And the third type of symptom is pneumonic plague, which may also include fever chills, cough, but also severe headache and which may cause death if not treated in the early stage. Plague is a disease that can be cured in the modern days and there are tests that is available to show whether you are infected or not and these test include culture of bubo, culture of sputum, blood culture, and lymph node culture. Plague is now a disease that can be easily prevented by staying away from areas where plague can exist and also from high risk animals such as rodents that are no longer around us in large numbers like they used to be in the medieval times. Typhus Typhus, also called murine typhus, epidemic typhus, endemic typhus, or jail fever, is an infectious disease, which is transmitted by lies for fleas. It is often presented by high fever, transient rash, and severe illness. Typhus is a rickettsial disease caused by one of two organisms, Rickettsia prowazekii (epidemic typhus) and Rickettsia typhi (murine or endemic typhus). Murine typhus occurs in the South Eastern and Southern States in the United States. There are less than hundred cases per year. Murine typhus is a milder form and is seldom fatal. Its is frequently seen in the fall and typically last two or three weeks. Murine typhus is often transmitted by rat fleas or rat feces or exposure to other animals such as cats, oposums, raccoons, skunks and rats. Epidemic typhus occurs in low sanitary conditions, which is why it is sometimes called jail fever. It usually occurs when the temperature is cold and is spread by lice. Although very rare, flying squirrels have been blamed for spreading the diseases by carrying infected lice and fleas. During World War I and II, typhus spread through North Africa, the Pacific Islands, and Europe, especially in German concentration camps. In North Africa, the epidemics involved mainly civilian populations. Epidemic typhus began to decline at the end of World War II when DDT started to be used as on insecticide. Ethiopia, Rwanda, Nigeria, Burundi were the main countries of typhus in Africa in the 1970’s. Recent political trouble in Eastern European and African countries caused typhus outbreaks while in Yugoslavia and Rwanda, older persons have contracted epidemic typhus. Symptoms of murine typhus include headache, backache, joint paint, extremely high fever (105-106 degrees F ) which may last up to two weeks, rash that begins on the trunk and spreads to arms and legs, nausea and vomiting in most patients, hacking, dry cough and abdominal pain. Symptoms of epidemic typhus include severe headache, high fever (104 degree F), cough in 75% of the patients, severe joint pain and muscle pain, chills, falling blood pressure, stupor, delirium, rash that begins on chest and spreads to the rest of the body and photophobia. For prevention of typhus, immunization and louse control are every effective, however, vaccines are not regularly available. Lice are resistant to DDT but lice may be eliminated by dusting infested persons with malathion or lindane. The treatment of typhus is to eliminate the infection and to treat the symptoms with antibiotics such as tetracycline, doxycycli...