 Hello and welcome to HealthFocus, a production of the Ministry of Health and Wellness. I am Phenileptian. Today, we have with us at the district medical officer, Dr. Alton Wilson, who will provide us with some information on dengue. Welcome to the program. Yes, good morning. Dengue is something that affects the St. Lucian population every year. Can you tell us what is dengue? Yeah, so dengue is a vector-borne viral illness. It has a global distribution, most commonly in the tropics. It is spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito. Usually, we would have an outbreak almost every year. But this year, for example, we begin to see a lot more cases than usual. It's quite an exceptional year for us. Okay, and you mentioned dengue outbreak. Can you provide us with some information as to what is a dengue outbreak? What does it mean for a country when we are in dengue outbreak mode? Yes, so you would always expect to have cases every year. But when you would get a year where you would have significantly more cases than expected, when you would surpass a certain threshold, then you would say you would add an outbreak. This year, so far, we've had more than 400 cases, which is not the same compared to our previous years. And it was somewhat expected because the French Caribbean islands have also been having quite a few cases. And because of regional travel, between the French islands, we would expect us to suffer from that also. And can you elaborate as to how is dengue transmitted? Yes, so through the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which is the vector for this virus, the female mosquito is the one that actually bites and spreads the virus. That mosquito is more of a daytime feeder with its peak feeding times being sunset and sunrise. This is the same mosquito of note that spreads zika and chickenganya. So what would happen is a mosquito would bite an infected person, and it could go bite a non-infected person and then can spread that virus along. Okay, and you mentioned the times where the mosquito would bite, the peak times. But how can a person prevent themselves from getting dengue? Yes, so this is very important because these are the measures that are needed to help control the outbreak of dengue. For the home, definitely we can use mosquito nets, we can use repellents, we can use long sleeves, long pants just to avoid bites. Many people use different methods, some people use citronella candles, but we just want to avoid being bitten. Now that's one thing, but even of greater importance are the breeding sites. Okay, and the breeding sites are what really causes problems because especially in times where you have droughts, where you would have people moving to storing of water in containers and bottles, these form breeding sites. You would have during the rainy season, anything can form a receptacle to collect water. You would have coconuts that you would cut open and the open side will be facing up, rain falls. Water collects, that's a breeding site. In our flower vases, water gets collected there, that's a breeding site. So what you would have is you would have significant amount of mosquitoes in a ridge in an area if you do not control the breeding sites. Okay, the Ministry of Health are also doing steps where they go to different communities, just the communities that more have significant cases where they would have the fumigation and a lot of public education. Because even though everyone knows about Dengue, we still find out that we're not having a lot of steps being taken, especially around the home, to get rid of those breeding sites. Because most times those mosquitoes, they don't really go too far, they're right in your home, in your backyard. These are where we have those breeding sites. You would have sometimes the gutters that have poor drainage. But this is a mosquito that also likes clean water. So in your flower vases and those other containers around the house do cause significant breeding sites. Wonderful. So definitely it has to do with mosquito control. Definitely. Okay. And what are some of the signs and symptoms of Dengue? So most of the cases of Dengue are mild, the majority are mild. So most times you would have people presenting with fever, that's the most common symptom. Fever, chills, some body pains, you have a headache, especially have pain behind the eyeballs. And that would be the most general one. You would have cases where people would have vomiting, okay, nauseous, diarrhea. And these cases are usually managed at home or might just go to a doctor. And they do not cause much problems to say. And that part is not much of a problem. Because these symptoms are mild and very easily managed. But you would have certain cases of Dengue that are more severe. Okay, we would like to refer to it as Dengue with warning signs. And this is what that could be concerning for us, the health care system and for your physician. I would like you to hold on to that thought because we are due for a break. We'll be back in a moment. Cancer is the second leading cause of death. One in every six St. Lucian males and one in every five St. Lucian females will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime. Smoking, alcohol, lack of exercise, stress and poor eating habits increase the risk of cancer. Changing these is our best chance at preventing up to 50% of cancer. Sometimes though, in spite of these efforts, cancer still happens. Knowing what to look for is our second best chance for early detection and treatment. Be informed. Let's talk. Contact us at St. Lucia Cancer Society. Telephone 452 1538. Welcome back. We will continue our discussion with Dr. Alton Wilson on Dengue. Before we took the break, we were discussing the signs and symptoms of Dengue and you spoke on the mild symptoms, but you started discussing the severe symptoms. Can you elaborate a little more on this? Yes. So along with all of the mild symptoms, the fever, the joint pains, the muscle pains, the headache, the pain behind the eyes, you would have some signs that would be worrying to us. Severe abdominal pain, that would be concerning. Persistent vomiting, that would also be concerning. Sometimes people would have diarrhea with it. If you would be extremely weak, very lethargic, these are also warning signs. These signs would tell us that, hey, you need to seek attention. You need to present to one of the facilities because if you have persistent vomiting, for example, you're at a great risk of dehydration and you might need fluids. Your doctor would definitely want to run some tests to see how severe is that case going. Dengue also has a more severe form called a more severe Dengue. That one could get really bad. It can lead to ICU admissions for patients. Dengue is a disease that can actually be fatal. Thankfully for us, we haven't had one in quite some time, but we still need to be very vigilant on Dengue cases and make sure the moment we see any warning signs, we present to our physician. Sometimes you just have a little fever, little body pains, a little headache. You can take your pan at all, your paracetamol and you're good. But the moment the vomiting is persistent, you're extremely weak. See, via abdominal pain, we definitely need to present. And how is Dengue treated? Dengue is a self-limiting disease. Your body would normally create viruses, provided that you do not have a severe form. That would require hospitalization and where we get IV fluid and whatnot. But most times we would use paracetamol, your ordinary paracetamol brands. One of the complications of Dengue is that it does have a hemorrhagic form. And that comes under the warning signs also. Any bleeding to Dengue Cosa, any abnormal bleeding at all is also another warning sign. So for that reason tablets, pills like aspirin should be avoided or any of the NSAIDs like ibuprofen and those, because those does affect your body's clotting factors. So we would not want you to take those medications. You would just use panadol, control the fever, control the little headache, adequate fluids, drink well, keep yourself well hydrated and eat properly, bed rest, get plenty of bed rest. Okay, so you're saying that with four persons who may have the mild symptoms such as the fever and body aches, they can use paracetamol. But if it gets to the point of severe where you have the bleeding of the gowns or the belly ache, that is when they should actually get to see a doctor. Yes, definitely. But you might not necessarily have to have all of those warning signs to present your physician. For example, if the headache is very, very intense and it's not getting good enough really with the paracetamol, you might want to visit the doctor for those symptoms. But for sure, okay, if you have any of those warning signs, bleeding from anywhere, you should definitely present your doctor. Abdominal pain, persistent vomiting, definitely. If you have one episode of vomit and you're able to take in fluids, then that's relatively okay. But definitely you should present if the symptoms become significant. And of course, you have the risk groups that we would always like to present to the facility. If you have a baby of less than one year old, definitely bring that baby in. If you are an elderly more than 65 years and have other comorbidities, definitely would definitely want to see you at your nearest healthcare provider. Okay. And can dengue be cured? When it comes to cure, yes, you would get it and your body would cry. Normally, dengue usually lasts about five to seven days. In some cases, it might go up to 10 days. We have four strains of dengue. Okay, there are four serotypes. In our population, we have two types circulating. That is type two and type three. The thing about dengue is if you would get one type, you should get immunity for that type afterwards. So you should not get that same type afterwards. But if you get a different type, if you get dengue of second type, a second time, sorry, of a different subtype, then you are at a greater risk of developing severe dengue. Okay. So that is of importance. The same substrain, the same strain of dengue, you can't really get it twice but there are four strains. So you can get dengue essentially four times. Provided you get all four strains. But in solution, so far, all we have documented is just strain two and three. Okay. And finally, how can a person get tested for dengue? So, presently, the dengue test is free. Okay, this is very important. At all of our public labs, so the lab at Grocery Polyclinic, the lab at OKAU, the test is free. It is an actual blood test. What happens is the test aids us a lot in knowing how much, how many cases of dengue we have circulating. Sometimes people would, they would be given the test by the physician to get tested. And they might not really do it because sometimes they would be like, hey, I'm already feeling better. I'm not that bad. But it helps us a lot. And it also helps us keep track of what strains of dengue we have going around the place. Okay, because right now, as I said, we only have three and four. But if we're not testing, we won't know. Sorry, two and three. If we're not testing, we won't know if we have in any of the other serotypes of dengue, which is important for us to know. Thank you so much. Well, that's how we come to the end of our discussion for today. I want to thank you so much for being part of our program. It was definitely a pleasure providing us with information on dengue. Thank you so much. All right, thank you. On behalf of the entire production team, I am Fenel Neptune. Thanks for watching. Until next time.