The second indigenous dengue fever case of this year has been confirmed, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported on Wednesday.
A student in New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang District (新莊) came down with a fever, nausea, vomiting, and aches and pains on Saturday last week, and was hospitalized the next day before being sent home.
He sought medical treatment again on Monday after experiencing diarrhea. After a blood test, he was confirmed on Tuesday to have a dengue virus type 2 (DENV-2) infection and put into isolation.
The patient did not travel overseas during the incubation period prior to the onset of the disease, but he did stay with his family in Kaohsiung from July 3 to July 6 before traveling to Taitung, CDC Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said.
Health authorities are tracing the possible source of infection, Lo said.
It was thought that the patient’s diarrhea was related to dengue fever, Lo said, but a local survey found that only about 33 percent of patients infected with DENV-2 during a 2015 dengue outbreak in Taiwan reported diarrhea.
A Kaohsiung man in his 30s became the first reported indigenous dengue fever case this year, the CDC reported earlier this month.
He was confirmed to have a dengue virus type 3 (DENV-3) infection and has been in isolation since July 1, the CDC said.
There have been 103 imported cases of dengue fever so far this year, with 95, 120, 147 and 124 cases reported during the same period the previous four years, CDC data showed.
Everyone should take precautionary measures when traveling to dengue-endemic countries, the CDC said, adding that one should seek treatment as soon as possible when symptoms of dengue fever — which include fever, headaches, severe muscle and joint pain, eye socket pain and skin rashes — become apparent.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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