BREAKING! Thailand News: Parents Warned That Thailand Reporting Increased Cases Of RSV (Respiratory Syncytial Virus) Affecting Young Children Severely
Thailand News: Various private and public hospitals across Thailand are reporting that there is an increasing number of cases of pediatric infections with the RSV virus or Respiratory Syncytial Virus that tends to affect young children and infants very severely with many such cases now in ICU.
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Respiratory syncytial virus, also called human respiratory syncytial virus and Human orthopneumovirus, is a virus that causes respiratory tract infections, with the infected cells of the mucosa fusing together to form a syncytium.
Respiratory syncytial virus is the cause of 50% to 90% of pediatric hospitalizations for bronchiolitis, 5% to 40% of hospitalizations for pneumonia and 10% to 30% of hospitalizations for croup (aryngotracheobronchitis)
Infants and children under the age of 6 are more prone to getting infected.
The Respiratory Syncytial Virus, which enters the upper respiratory tract and replicates in the nasopharynx, may spread to the lower respiratory tract in 1 to 3 days and cause inflammation of the small airway and airflow obstruction. The incubation period is usually 3 to 6 days, and children are contagious for 3 to 8 days, unless they are immunosuppressed.
The RSV virus manifests as upper respiratory tract infections, such as rhinitis and otitis media, or lower respiratory tract infections, such as croup, bronchiolitis or pneumonia. It may manifest as apnea in premature infants.
Approximately 70% of infants are infected with RSV in the first year of life, and almost all are symptomatic, he said. About 20% of the cases result in lower respiratory tract infections. Re-infection is common, although subsequent infections tend to be more mild. Hospitalization related to RSV most commonly occurs in children aged up to 2 years who have congenital heart disease or chronic lung disease.
However it seems that a more aggressive form of the virus or the
NA1 genotype seems to be circulating around as most of the reported cases in Thailand in the last 2 weeks tend to be serious cases with many requiring ICU care.
Parents are asked to immediately take their children to a hospital if they exhibit even mild symptoms such as fever, cough, presence of sputum and mucus, breathlessness and wheezing.
Children already having lung and heart issues are at a higher mortality risk.
Children with asthma and allergies are also at a higher risk for severity.
There is no vaccine to date for RSV.
Parents are also encourage to maintain the same precautionary measure as with COVID-19 such as avoid taking your children to crowded locations, wash hands, wear a mask, main social distancing, keep bodies warm and to immediately see a doctor should any symptoms materialize even how minor.
To date, severe cases are being reported not only in Bangkok but across various provinces across the country.
Thailand Medical News will be continuing to provide more updates on this developing story.
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