No reason to be panicked on chikungunya disease: experts

People should not get panicked over Chikungunya as there is no alarming clinical features of the disease, health experts told a workshop today.

No emergency medical treatment requires for Chikungunya diseases as it is easily curable, they told the workshop on "Chikungunya and dengue diseases" in the conference room of Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR) at Mohakhali, BSS reported.

Directorate General of Health Service(DGHS) and the IEDCR jointly organized the workshop aiming to prevent outbreak of chikungunya and dengue diseases by educating people on the vector-borne diseases.

Director General of DGHS Prof Dr Abul kalam Azad, President of Society of Medicine, Bangladesh Prof Khan Abul Kalam Azad, Director of Disease Control and Line Director of CDC of DGHS, among others, addressed the workshop with Director of IEDCR Prof Dr Meerjady Sabrina Flora was in the chair.

Journalists from different print and electronic media took part in the workshop.

Prof Azad said, "Chikungunya is not serious like other mosquito-borne diseases. After a particulate time, patients get recovery without receiving any special medical treatment. Chikungunya infected patients should not be admitted to hospitals and even they do not need to go to hospitals for any test to diagnose the disease."

He said massive awareness campaign should be launched to educate the people about Chikungunya so that they can take proper measures for recovering the diseases.

Prof Dr Meerjady Sabrina Flora said chikungunya is a viral disease which is transmitted to humans by infected mosquitoes.

Chikungunya was first described during an outbreak in southern Tanzania in 1952, she said, adding the outbreak of the disease has increased 30 times higher in the past 50 years.

Prof Khan said symptoms of the disease appear between four and seven days after a person is bitten by any infected mosquito. Chikungunya is characterised by an abrupt onset of high fever frequently accompanied by joint pain, he added.

Health experts stressed the need for destroying all potential breeding sources of mosquitoes to prevent outbreak of chikungunya and dengue diseases.

According to health experts, other common signs and symptoms of the disease include muscle pain, headache, nausea, fatigue and rash.

The joint pain is often very debilitating, but usually lasts for a few days or may be prolonged to weeks. Hence the virus can cause acute, sub-acute or chronic disease, they added.