RESEARCH ARTICLE
Chikungunya Fever: A New Concern For the Western Hemisphere
Jennifer Ann Marie Calder*, 1, 2, Donovan Norton Calder3, 4
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2015Volume: 9
First Page: 13
Last Page: 19
Publisher Id: TOIDJ-9-13
DOI: 10.2174/1874279301509010013
Article History:
Received Date: 8/12/2014Revision Received Date: 9/3/2015
Acceptance Date: 12/3/2015
Electronic publication date: 15/5/2015
Collection year: 2015
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Chikungunya virus has spread from Tanzania and has caused autochthonous transmission throughout Africa and Asia, and most recently in Europe, and the Americas. Transmission into new geographical areas has been facilitated by many factors including international travel, genetic adaptation of the virus to the vectors, and a breakdown of vector control measures. The economic impact on affected countries may be severe as a result of the immediate effect on the healthcare services and loss of man-hours as well as the potential effect on tourism. Effective control will require early diagnosis and isolation of viremic persons as well as enhanced environmental measures. To stop transmission in the region will require a regional effort that involves public education and an interdisciplinary One Health approach.