Australia’s public health authorities are considering whether to vaccinate thousands more people to counter the country’s first outbreak of Japanese encephalitis.
Leading infectious disease expert Allen Cheng said JEV caused a spectrum of disease. Mostly it is not serious, but in less than 1 per cent of cases it can be fatal or cause inflammation of the brain or spinal cord, resulting in permanent injury. The worry is that the virus has been detected in more than 50 piggeries so far. These animals act as sentinels and might represent the presence of the virus in other animals, such as feral pigs.According to Australian Pork Limited, there are more than 4000 commercial piggeries in Australia, housing about 2.4 million pigs at any one time.
The Communicable Diseases Network Australia has also prioritised jabs for families, including children aged two months and older, who live near piggeries, pork abattoirs or pork rendering plants and those who work with mosquito surveillance or control, in the field or in research/diagnostic laboratories.The virus was detected in piggeries in southern parts of Australia in February.
“We have a little window at the moment because mosquitoes don’t hang around southern Australia over winter. Although the risk may decrease in the next couple of months, we need to work out if vaccines are needed, and we’ll want to do that before the end of the year.”
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Source: 7NewsAustralia - 🏆 11. / 71 Read more »