The chikungunya virus, whose symptoms are similar to dengue has claimed the lives of 21 people in the Caribbean since last December when it was detected the presence of this native fever in the region, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Martinique tops the list with 12 deaths, after submitting 35,000 suspected cases of infection (1,515 tested), while in Dominican Republic, Guadeloupe and Saint Martin (French part, with 3,430 suspected and 793 checks) has reported the deaths of three people.
WHO noted that in the Caribbean and Latin America 302 243 4,756 infected and suspected cases were reported.
"The lethality of the virus is extremely low, is minimal. People are dying because they had previous illnesses were elderly patients with diseases that weaken, "said Pilar Ramón Pardo, advises on Clinical Management of Infectious Diseases of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).
The virus causes high fever, joint pain, rash, headache and muscle. It can only be purchased once and has no cure, although, according to Pardo, scientific laboratories in U.S. Europe and advance research to create a vaccine.
In Peru last Friday confirmed a third case.
The explosion of chikungunya indigenously, ie directly by the bite of the Aedes aegypti or Aedes albopictus, which transmits dengue was detected for the first time on American soil in December 2013, on the island of St. Maarten.
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