According to the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “eleven countries, including the United States, have reported a total of 169 cases of severe acute hepatitis in healthy children aged 1 month to 16 years old, with the largest outbreak in the United Kingdom.” Of the 169 reported cases at least 17 children have required a liver transplant and one child has died. The definition of hepatitis is inflammation of the liver. Inflammation typically presents as swelling of tissue or organ when that tissue or organ has been injured or infected. The swelling that takes place in the liver then causes damage and affects how well the liver functions. There are different types of hepatitis but the most common is viral hepatitis. According to medlineplus.gov, “It (viral hepatitis) is caused by one of several viruses – hepatitis viruses A, B, C, D, and E. In the United States, A, B, and C are the most common.” Short-term and long-term infections arise from hepatitis depending on the type of hepatitis causing the infection.
Again, according to medlineplus.gov, “Hepatitis A and hepatitis E usually spread through contact with food or water that was contaminated with an infected person’s stool. You can also get hepatitis E by eating undercooked pork, deer, or shellfish. Hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and hepatitis D spread through contact with the blood of someone who has the disease. Hepatitis B and D may also spread through contact with other body fluids.” Currently, there are vaccines to prevent hepatitis A and hepatitis B and most receive these vaccines as an infant and young child. Interestingly, the current outbreak of hepatitis does not appear to be caused by these common hepatitis viruses A, B, C, D, and E. At this time, the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control are thinking that these cases of hepatitis have been possibly caused by adenovirus.
According to the cdc.gov, “Adenoviruses are common viruses that cause a range of illness. They can cause cold-like symptoms, fever, sore throat, bronchitis, pneumonia, diarrhea, or pink eye.” This common virus can hit at any age and the severity of the cases can differ from person to person. In the past, adenovirus more often caused more severe issues, including hepatitis, in those with a weakened immune system, but hepatitis had never been a result in healthy children. The link of adenovirus to hepatitis continues to be investigated, but it’s important for parents to be aware of the possibility.
Questions:
- Do you think that this new outbreak of hepatitis is caused by adenovirus and if so, should a vaccine be developed to help prevent the severity?
- If this hepatitis outbreak is caused by adenovirus, in what ways do you think the spread of the virus could be slowed down?
- Why do you think adenovirus is now causing hepatitis in healthy children when previously it was only causing cases in children with weakened immune systems?
Sources:
Replies
New topic choice so +5! You did a great job Kyia! I would like to see moe of your thoughts and opinions within your summary as well.
I don't think there will be another outbreak because of our new technology and all of the new vaccines to control all of the bacterias. I think that maybe adenovirus could cause it but with covid I think we would be able to control it more.
I agree since our technology and vaccines are more advanced than other places I feel like we will have it under control. Also I think with our technology and vaccines we would be able to slow the spread if it were get worse.I agree that the adenovirus may be causing this new outbreak of hepatitis all around the world.
I don't think that there will be another huge outbreak because there's vaccines and medicines to control it. I think that the adenovirus could be causing it. If there was another outbreak we could probably be able to control it.
I agree that there most likely will not be another outbreak as we have good medicine and vaccines to be able to protect us against different viruses. I agree that there is a chance that this new outbreak could be caused by the Adenovirus. I also agree that if there were to be a big outbreak the we would be able to take steps to keep the spread under control.
I think there's a high probabilty that this new outbreak of hepatitis can be caused by adenovirus. If this is what is causing it, then there should be a vaccine developed to help prevent/cure this and anyone who gets it. We could easily slow the spread of diseases we've been trying soo hard to contain.
I agree that there is a very high chance that this new outbreak may be caused by Adenovirus. I also think that if that is true then we need to come up with a vaccine to help protect people against this new outbreak against the new outbreak. I agree that we could take steps to help stop/slow the spread of this new infection.
It is probably a possibility that an adenovirus could cause anything including hepatitis and if that is what caused it then a vaccine should be developed to help anybody who gets it. They could probably slow down the spread of the virus by doing the normal things they do for other viruses.
I agree that there is a big posibility that the Adenovirus could lead to Hepatitis and if that is true then we need to make a vaccine that helps to fight against this new strain of Hepatitis. I agree that we could slow down the spread of Hepatitis by doing things we do to slow the spread of other common and contagious viruses.
I don't think there will be another hepatitis outbreak because medicine and vaccines are so advanced now. I think we would be able to stop it before it went into a huge breakout. I think creating a new vaccine and doing some tests on it now rather than later could help stop the spread.
-
1
-
2
of 2 Next