TEAM HERALD
PANJIM: Change of weather is often accompanied by ill health, and it’s no surprise that at this time of the year the Hand, Foot and Mouth disease has afflicted children.
However, this year, paediatricians have admitted that the illness has shown itself in a more severe form with more than usual children being affected by the virus causing parents of school and nursery going children to panic.
“While it is normal for there to be cases of the Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease (HFMD), this year the cases are more than usual,” a senior paediatrician working at Campal Clinic Hospital, told Herald.
While it is difficult the quantify the percentage increase or even the total number of cases, given that records of the disease are not centrally maintained, doctors estimate that the number of cases all over the state will be in thousands.
Parents of school going children have reported that many of the children coming to schools and nurseries and kindergartens are reporting symptoms of the viral infection.
Doctors have however cautioned that there’s no need to panic as the ailment is harmless and besides the appearance of boils around the affected child’s mouth, arms, elbows and feet (hence the name), which also disappear once the disease is overcome there are no other known afflictions of the disease.
“The infection is generally so there’s no need to panic,” he said. The appearance of boils on the skin of a child often causes parents, especially young mothers of infants to panic, not knowing what has afflicted the child.
It all begins with a couple of days of mild fever accompanied by poor appetite and ‘chicken pox like boils’ on the hands, feet and lips that cause the child to become restless on account of the itching.
What accentuates the misery of an infected child is that HFMD has no specific treatment, nor has a vaccine been developed yet. Only the symptoms like fever, lameness and pain from the sores can be soothed with medication like antipyretics (medication to bring down fever).
Everyone is at risk of being infected including adults, but not everyone who is infected becomes ill. Infants and children below six years are more susceptible to the infection because of weaker immune systems as compared to adults. Also, symptoms do not manifest themselves in some children.
Schools normally are issued guidelines formulated by the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) about preventing quick spreading of viral diseases among school children through personal contact.
