A new discovery could help fight Chikungunya in South America
Buenos Aires, Argentina, is a mosquito-borne disease epidemic: The case of Chikungunya in Mozambican and Tanzanian
Dr. Lloveras is the infectious disease doctor at Hospital Muiz in Buenos Aires, Argentina, which is one of several South American countries where mosquito-borne illness has surged in the last five years. Their hands and feet commonly ache along with their knees. The pain can get so bad that some have difficulty walking or even holding a cup of coffee.
“It affects the quality of life,” says Lloveras. You are fine.” And suddenly, you can’t move, you need another person help you to do the common task of every day.”
Although the disease is rarely fatal, the worst symptom can be long-lasting joint pain. But new advances, including a study just published this week, may soon help us outfox this virus — whose name is pronounced “chicken-GOON-ya” and according to the World Health Organization, comes from the Kimakonde language, spoken in parts of Tanzania and Mozambique, and means “to become contorted.”
A quarter of a million new cases have been counted in South America this year. Over 100,000 people have been diagnosed with the outbreak in a single area, as in Paraguay.
She says that earlier this year they had patients with no travel history for Chikungunya. It is for the first time that mosquitoes in Buenos Aires have transmitted the disease.
The disease’s footprint is growing. “Wherever the mosquitoes go, we will have chikungunya, and it’s a global concern,” says Nischay. With the climate changing and temperatures getting warmer, “there are more chances mosquitoes can survive everywhere,” he says.
Chikungunya and the Immune System Kicks a Cell into a Tuning Mechanism for Viruses to Get Settled
It can be difficult to treat joint pain for months or even years because the immune systems of some sufferers have created an anti-vaccine cocktail that clears the virus.
“It’s early days,” says Kielian, “but it suggests this might be one mechanism by which the virus can get established, maybe in joint tissues. It might be important in causing arthritis. We’ll see.”
In a study done in mice, scientists found that there was an element that could help solve this mystery.
Mostviruses cause us to be sick by turning our cells into machines. There are lots of new particles that can go on toinfecting new cells when released by them. There’s another trick Chikungunya has.
One or two tendrils, sometimes as long as the cell itself, snake outwards, at times toward uninfected cells. And these tendrils can escape attack by the immune system. “That contact between the cells shields the virus from being detected by the immune system,” says Kielian. That’s how that cell gets kicked into gear.
Vaccine Development for the Emerging Infectious Diseases: A Study During the 2011-2011 Meeting of the Experts in Buenos Aires
“This information is very useful,” especially as it relates to vaccine development, says Mishra, who wasn’t involved in the study. “How the vaccine is gonna deal with this alternative mechanism of infection, that will be very interesting and very important.”
Several vaccine efforts are underway and Mishra says one may be approved as soon as the end of this year. It would be a welcome development in a place like Hospital Muñiz in Buenos Aires.
“We need a vaccine because this is another tool [to] treat this kind of disease,” says Dr. Lloveras. She adds that in the future, she and her team will need every tool they can get to fight all manner of mosquito-borne viruses, including chikungunya.
Chikungunya has been detected in mosquito bites for the first time in Argentina’s Buenos Aires. “Wherever the mosquitoes go, we’ll have chikungunya, and it’s a global concern,” the city’s Health Minister said. The first case of chikungunya was reported in Mozambique earlier this year and the virus has now been detected in Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Peru.