Colder season caused measles outbreak in Bulacan
BULAKAN, Bulacan— Don’t just prepare warmer jackets and thicker clothes, also grab your daily dose of Vitamin C and alcohols as the continuous cold season brought deadly measle-outbreak in our province. Measles, or tigdas, is spread through respiration, and is highly contagious—90% of people without immunity sharing living space with an infected person will catch it. Since the start of 2014, recorded measles cases in the ballooned up to 43 and still rising weekly, Provincial Health Office confirmed. Neil Jerome Celis, an 18 year-old student from Bulacan State University, is only one of the victims of the outbreak. He said he didn’t knew it was measles that struck him because he only had cough and colds. “No’ng una inuubo lang ako at sinisipon, tapos nawala, then after no’n, pumasok na ko sa school. After three days, nagkalagnat na ko ng mataas,” he narrated. After reading a deadly 41º Celsius fever, he immediately rushed to the hospital. Then the doctor said that their only counting days until Celis will be second fatality caused by measles. When asked if he knew someone who struck by measles, he admitted that one of his classmates also have measles and he suspects that he got infected by him. “No’ng una kasi, hindi n’ya sinasabi sa ‘min na nilalagnat na s’ya, tapos nakakalaro ko pa s’ya ng DotA [a computer game], tapos kinabukasan, may lagnat na rin ako.,” he said. Cold weather tolerates the spread of airborne virus such as paramyxovirus, the primary virus that causes measles and attacks the respiratory system of a person, making him/her have cough and colds first before small dots appear on his/her skin, which is the strongest indicator of having measles. So far, only one fatality caused by measles is recorded, in the town of San Miguel. |
“No’ng una kasi, hindi n’ya sinasabi sa ‘min na nilalagnat na s’ya, tapos nakakalaro ko pa s’ya ng DotA [a computer game], tapos kinabukasan, may lagnat na rin ako.,” he said. |