Cuba steps up effort against dengue fever
Goal is to contain outbreak in eastern city
Officials say the outbreak is worrisome, but not of epidemic proportions. They say common flu, rather than dengue, appears to be afflicting most of the several thousand people reported hospitalized in Santiago.
Some 1,500 to 2,000 true dengue cases have been reported so far, the head of Cuba's Tropical Medicine Institute, Dr. Gustavo Kouri, told reporters. The death toll has been variously reported at 10 to 20.
Dengue is common throughout the tropics, but a recent spate of heavy rains and hot weather in eastern Cuba sparked the outbreak of the mosquito-borne disease, which causes fever, chills and aching muscles.
Cuba has been short of money for insecticides and other chemical controls, and several small outbreaks of other infectious diseases have been reported on the island over the past five years.
Government media have reported little on the outbreak, but foreign and independent journalists in Cuba say health officials have launched a massive campaign to contain the fever in Santiago, Cuba's second-largest city with 435,000 people.
Soldiers are fumigating all houses in the four neighborhoods most affected, and patients are being kept in hospital beds covered with mosquito nets to make sure that mosquitoes don't bite them and spread the fever.
No dengue cases have been confirmed outside Santiago, but airplane and truck fumigation have been stepped up in Havana and other cities over the past few weeks, journalists reported.
Cubans have been alarmed by the Santiago outbreak because of their memories of a four-month epidemic in 1981 that struck 344,230 people and killed 158, including 101 children.
The World Health Organization reported 175,000 dengue cases in Brazil last year, 20,687 in Mexico, 9,180 in Venezuela, and 4,655 in Puerto Rico. The fever has also been reported in the southern U.S. states.
A Madrid newspaper reported the latest Cuban outbreak had provoked ``nervousness'' among potential tourists in Spain and Italy, but the flow of Miami Cubans visiting the island does not appear to have been affected.
There have been no cancellations of reservations due to the dengue outbreak, said Vivian Mannerud, who owns Airline Brokers Co., an agency that charters flights to Cuba.
Dengue is caused by four strains of a virus transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which breeds in stagnant water. There is no vaccine and little treatment other than painkillers, rest and liquids to prevent dehydration.
Symptoms appear about a week after a bite by an infected mosquito and last five to 10 days. First infections are usually no worse than a bad flu, but reinfections can lead to the sometimes fatal hemorrhagic type.
Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald