Fulminant Myocarditis (linked to influenza? infection) responsible for some "unidentified fever" cases

[Ronan Kelly]

Doctors identify virus of ?unidentified fever?
12 June 2013
kanchan siddiqui
DURGAPUR, 12 JUNE: The virus causing Fulminant Myocarditis has been identified as the key factor behind the epidemic so long termed as ?unidentified fever.?
A district like Burdwan recorded on an average 350 casualties in a year since 2008 and most of the victims were minors. Dr Dipayan Haldar, Deputy CMOH-II, Burdwan said: ?Changing food habit with partaking of junk food are responsible for such fatal ailments, especially from African countries. In 2008 such fever had caused epidemic claiming several lives in Purulia. In Burdwan, too, in the last couple of years nearly 350 persons succumbed to the fever annually. We collected serum and spinal fluids and the laboratory analysis suggested a virus had gripped the cerebral and cardiac system of the patients.? Dr VKG Rajasekar Pal Pandian, director, Interventional Cardiology with the Vivekananda Hospital, after examining a 32-year-old patient taken to the health care unit from Deoghar, Jharkhand with high fever, chest pain, dehydration and nausea diagnosed that it was a case of Viral Fulminant Myocarditis. He said: ?Fulminant Myocarditis associated with influenza virus is extremely rare and is very difficult to detect.?
...
http://www.thestatesman.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=460673&catid=72

 

[tetano]

Re: Fulminant Myocarditis (linked to influenza? infection) responsible for some "unidentified fever" cases

See the thread about influenza and myocarditis:

http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=180120

 

[alert]

Re: Fulminant Myocarditis (linked to influenza? infection) responsible for some "unidentified fever" cases

I have to doubt the quality of this article. There is little evidence that any of the unidentified fevers come "from African countries". If the deaths are due to myocarditis, it likely has little to do with "junk food" (which might not have the same meaning here that it does in Western media; I suspect "junk food" here means contaminated/inferior quality food). And without specifying which strains of "influenza" have been detected, there is no reason to think the unidentified "virus" is really influenza. It could be something like dengue, chikungunya, or leptospirosis, all of which can affect the heart.

And, as the end of the article suggests, if the patients are responding well to an undientifed cheap medicine (an antibiotic?), that might argue against this diagnosis. If the medicine were Tamiflu, I think they would have stated it.

Fulminant myocarditis in pediatric patients should also raise alarms for Kawasaki Disease.