Dealing With Disease in Uige, Angola :: Health Medical Personal Narrative Essays

Dealing With Disease in Uige, Angola diary Entry for April 21, 2005 Yesterday, Angolas Ministry of Health announced that there have been 266 documented tender-hearted infections of the Marburg epidemic since the current outbreak began in October of last year. 244 of these cases have been fatal, providing a horrific mortality rate which can be attributed both to the mostly unknown and uncontrollable nature of this disease, and the impoverished state of the nation it is afflicting. Unfortunately, it took us five months from the first suspected cases of the outbreak to positively identify the baffle as the Marburg virus. The regions medical facilities are severely overburdened and under-staffed due to the decades of accomplished war which have plagued Angola. So, when the epidemic began late last year proto(prenominal) cases were mistaken for other more common diseases such as typhoid and malaria--which have similar symptoms to the Marburg virus. On the first symptomatic day, an give person suffers from an passing high pyrexia. The extent of this fever quickly drains the individual of energy, leaving them in a weakened state. By the third day extremely watery diarrhea has begun which will last for a week if the infected is lucky enough to survive so long. The diarrhea also comes with consuming abdominal cramps, nausea, and vomiting. The result is a patient left in a state of dehydration and excruciating pain, weakened and unable to clean the begrime fluids he or she is expelling. Now having faced days of extreme fever and fatigue, the person resembles a corpse with an expressionless face, deep-set eyes and aggregate lack of energy. Between the fifth and seventh days hemorrhages appear on the body, often open to bleeding. Additional blood is excreted in the individuals vomit and feces, as well as from the nose, and gums. This prevalence of contaminated bodily fluids has been part of the intellect why reason the epidemic has continued to sp read despite our efforts to adjudge it. Death generally occurs within about two week of symptoms. at that place is no known cure, so the most our team can do for the infected is to keep their fluid levels high in order to oppose the effects of fever and diarrhea. The Marburg epidemic is a RNA virus of the filovirus family--whose just now other known members are the four Ebola viruses.