Increasing Risk of Dengue Fever in the USA

AUSTIN, Texas - Sept. 9, 2024 - PRLog -- Dengue Fever, also known as "Breakbone" Disease, has long Threatened Central and South American Populations

In June 2024, the CDC issued a Health Alert Network (HAN) Health Advisory that the dengue virus (DENV) – which causes the disease known as dengue fever – poses an increased threat in the United States.

Dengue fever, also commonly known as "Breakbone Disease" in Latin America, is a mosquito-borne disease that causes a range of symptoms, including joint pain, bone pain, muscle aches, pain behind the eyes, headache, nausea, vomiting, skin rash, and low white blood cell counts. Severe cases affecting about 5% of patients can lead to shock, severe bleeding, and respiratory distress.

According to the CDC, dengue fever cases worldwide are currently at an all-time high. In the Americas, nearly 10 million cases were reported in the first half of 2024, doubling the caseload in 2023. (Among the 4.6 million cases reported in 2023, there were 4,000 fatalities from the disease.)

Among the US territories, Puerto Rico has been especially hard hit. The Puerto Rican commonwealth declared a public health emergency after nearly 1,500 cases were diagnosed through June 2024. US travelers are also at risk, with about 750 cases detected.

Current Research in the Disease Pathology of Dengue Fever

What causes dengue fever?

According to the CDC, dengue fever is the most common of the arboviral diseases, e.g. those spread by insect bites.

Individual dengue fever cases are caused by one of four closely related dengue virus serotypes (e.g. variants) in the Flaviviridae family, which include the West Nile virus. The four dengue virus serotypes are named DENV-1, DENV-2, DENV-3, and DENV-4.

Patients recovering from one of these four virus variants are generally conferred with lifelong immunity to that one variant but only receive limited protection (estimated at 6 months) against the other three virus variants.

In other words, patients can acquire dengue fever disease multiple times (from different variants of the virus) throughout their lifetime.

Fortunately, dengue fever is not communicable between human patients; human infection requires mosquito transmission.

Clinical Testing Lab Protocols for Dengue Fever Disease Detection

Because patients can acquire dengue fever multiple times, clinical testing protocols for dengue fever need to take this into account. This means, for example, that a single IgG test showing a positive antibody test could be inconclusive.

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