THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: An 11-year-old boy from Kilimanoor in Thiruvananthapuram died of scrub typhus, a fever caused by larval mites, on Monday.
Sidharth, son of Ratheesh and Shubha died while undergoing treatment at SAT Hospital attached to the government medical college. He took treatment in a Public Health Centre for fever a week ago. When his health deteriorated he was shifted to SAT Hospital four days back.
The state has so far reported six scrub typhus deaths this year. There were five deaths reported in Thiruvananthapuram and 1 in Malappuram. This year there were over 250 persons detected with scrub typhus.
In the last decade, there were over 4,500 people tested positive for the scrub typhus, caused by the bite of an infected larval mite or “chiggers”. There were 68 deaths as well during the period.
The disease is caused by a bacteria called Orientia tsutsugamushi carried by the chiggers. The chiggers from the animals get stuck to grass and the bacterias find its way to the human body through chigger bites. The health department advised people to cover their body when playing or working in sand. The most common symptoms of scrub typhus include fever, headache, body aches, and sometimes rash. The disease becomes complicated in some people when it affects their brain and heart.
Scrub typhus has similar symptoms as that of typhoid, rat fever and dengue. The disease can be treated with antibiotics.
Scrub typhus is a treatable disease. But the mortality is upto 40% in untreatable cases. “There is no need to suspect scrub typhus in all fever cases. The presence of eschar (a scab) in the body is a sure sign for the disease. But eschar is found only in 40-80% patients. The treating doctor can start giving doxycycline even before the lab tests to confirm the disease. The antibiotic will give relief in the first 48 hours itself and it is used as a method to confirm the disease as well,” said Dr Althaf A, an epidemiologist and associate professor at Government Medical College Hospital, Thiruvananthapuram.
He conducted epidemiological and ecological study of Scrub Typhus covering different parts of Thiruvananthapuram when he was working in Thiruvananthapuram Medical College during the 2002-2005 period.
The health department started prescribing doxycycline along with paracetamol to all fever patients coming from areas mapped for Scrub Typhus prevalence in 2005.
Thiruvananthapuram contributes 75% percent of the scrub typhus cases in the state, followed by Wayanad (10%), Kozhikode (5%), Kannur, Malappuram and Palakkad.
