Critical review - Book Report/Review Example

The only control measures available are controlling the vector Aedes. The alarming nature of dengue is only recently realized and researches are being conducted to develop drugs and vaccines to manage and control the disease Dengue is an arthropod-borne systemic viral infection of humans (Bhatt et al., 2013). With approximately 50 million infections reported annually and 2.5 billion at risk (Guzman et al., 2010), the disturbing fact remains that the control options for the disease are limited, and targeted mainly at the control of Aedes aegypti, the transmitting mosquito (Walker et al., 2011). No licensed vaccines or therapy regimens are available despite the rising global burden of the disease.

In fact even the current global distribution and infection risk of dengue are incompletely understood (Bhatt et al., 2013). The earliest reports of dengue have been found in descriptions of “knee fever” epidemic from Cairo (Egypt), in 1779. The name itself is derived from the “Ki denga pepo” a Sawhili word for ‘sudden seizure by demon’. The disease was also termed as ‘break bone fever’ during Philadelphia epidemic outbreak in 1780. Other outbreaks have been reported from Hawaii (1903), and Greece (1927 & 1928).

Several terms used over the years that refer to dengue include dandy fever, Korean hemorrhagic fever, Thai hemorrhagic fever, Philippine hemorrhagic fever, 7 day fever, knee fever, and Dhaka fever (Thomgcharoen & Jatanasen, 1993). The World Health Organization (WHO) has recently provided a classification of dengue in to two groups: uncomplicated and severe fever replacing the prior three group classification in to undifferentiated, dengue and dengue hemorrhagic fever (Whitehorn & Farrar, 2010).

The clinical manifestations of dengue are similar to those of Chicungunya and O’nyong-nyong disease and vary from acute fibrile illness to severe Dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF) or dengue shock syndrome (DSS) (Bisen & Raghuvanshi,