Yellow Fever Essay

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Yellow Fever Yellow fever comes from a virus that is a copy of the genus Flavivirus which contains 70 different viruses and are mostly arthropod-borne. Before the development of vaccines, yellow fever was a much dreaded and fatal disease and as of 2001 still affects as many as 200,000 people annually in the tropics of Africa and South America (Monath). With the rise of air travel, the risk of introducing and spreading yellow fever to other areas of the world is bothersome. Therefore, there is an emphasis on preventative vaccination due to no effective treatments in place (Monath). Yellow fever is the original viral hemorrhagic fever, and what makes it different from the other VHSs, such as the Ebola virus, is its severity of hepatic injury and universal appearance of jaundice (Monath). Yellow fever is a dangerous disease because of its symptoms, mode of transmission, what can treat it and prognosis, and how it is diagnosed. Since it is the original viral hemorrhagic fever, yellow fever is a pansystemic viral sepsis with viraemia, fever, prostration, hepatic, renal, and myocardial injury, hemorrhage, shock, and high lethality. The genome sequence of yellow fever makes it appear that it may have evolved from other mosquito-borne viruses. The incubation period after a bite from an infected mosquito is 3-6 days, and the onset is rapid with fever, chills, malaise, headache, lower back pain, generalized myalgia, nausea, and dizziness (Monath). The patient will have congestion of conjunctivae and face and bradycardia in respect of the fever. The average fever runs about 39 degrees Celsius. Some abnormalities associated with yellow fever include leukopenia with a relative neutropenia, and between 48 to 72 hours after onset and before appearance of jaundice, the levels of serum transaminase may rise (Monath). The “period of infection” can last many days and can be

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