The Maricopa Country Health Department announced Monday that it has confirmed a case of dengue fever in humans believed to be caused by an infected mosquito in Arizona.
As
with Maricopa Country , which includes Phoenix and densely populated
surrounding areas, teams have been dispatched to neighborhoods to
provide free disease testing and information on how to prevent mosquito
bites from breeding.
Over
the past 100 years, dengue fever has spread dramatically as global
temperatures continue to rise due to climate change. A study published
earlier this year in the journal Frontiers in Public Health found that
the disease "will affect 60% of the world's population by 2080," thanks
to climate change.
“Dengue
fever is currently rampant, and climate change is one of the main
drivers of dengue epidemics,” said the study. “The most important
climatic factors related to dengue transmission are temperature,
precipitation and relative humidity.”
Routine
mosquito surveillance conducted by the Maricopa County Environmental
Services Department (MCESD) detected dengue virus in mosquito traps
located nearby in the county," the health department said in a release.
Although the mosquito-borne disease infects 400 million people and kills
up to 40,000 people a year, according to the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, most cases reported in the contiguous 48 states
are on the CDC website. It says it is "among travelers". People infected
elsewhere. "
An
estimated 100 million people are now infected with dengue each year,
which can cause symptoms ranging from flu-like symptoms to severe
bleeding, organ failure and death. The World Health Organization notes
that the surge in dengue cases is a recent phenomenon.
“The
number of dengue cases reported to WHO has increased more than
eight-fold over the past two decades, from 505,430 cases in 2000 to more
than 2.4 million in 2010 and more than 5.2 million in 2019. The number
of deaths reported between 2015 and 2015 ranged from 960 to 4,032,
mainly affecting younger age groups," the WHO explained on its website,
adding: The disease is currently endemic in more than 100 countries in
his WHO Region in Africa, the Americas, the Eastern Mediterranean,
Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific. "