The S.Am dengue lottery hits northern Peru in 2011

Dengue is like that, a lottery. In 2008 it was Brazil's bad lot, 2009 was Bolivia, 2010 saw Paraguay and northern Argentina hard hit. This year there's a major outbreak in the jungle regions of Peru centred around the city of Iquitos, with 7943 cases reported as at January 25th (dengue season tends to run until April) with 68 people seriously ill and 10 fatalities so far. To give an idea of the speed dengue spreads, the case number was at 4,450 on Janaury 20th. Not funny.

If you're travelling there, be careful and use those creams and pills. Meanwhile, Peru's fairly decent emergency health reaction teams are now getting into gear and the fumigation campaigns have started.

Dengue season

A banner in San Salvador, El Salvador, calling for no more deaths from dengue

Latin American health authorities report today (in a joint effort) that two million people have been affected so far this year by dengue, the illness transmitted by mosquito bites (well, bites from two specific types of mosquito, to be more accurate).

Two million is a lot with less than two months gone. Last year Bolivia had a full frontal attack, but this year the worst affected area is Colombia (dengue respects no frontiers and typically breaks out in force in a different tropical zone from year to year) but all LatAm, Tijuana on down, is affected. As well as Colombia, Brazil and Ecuador are in the firing line this time around, apparently.

Dengue isn't a very pleasant experience but as long as you're not bitten a second time while infected it's not life threatening. But a second bite will cause a serious illness and there have been 35 deaths so far this year (18 in Colombia) from the very nasty stage two dengue.

The season usually lasts until around May. Advice: If you're visiting, bring a mosquito net and those anti-bite creams.

Dengue: Such a serious problem that even Ruben Costas is talking sense

On February 5th IKN reported in this post that there was a serious dengue outbreak in the lowland region of Bolivia this year. Unfortunately, the whole thing has lived up to the worst expectations and there are now 35,000 cases of dengue confirmed amongst Bolivians, of whom 21 have died from the lethal hemorrage version type 2 (that occurs when a person is bitten twice by a dengue carrying mosquito).

Dengue "season" coincides with the rainy season in South America, and as such has the rest of March to run in all likelihood. That's far too long for a disease that is threatening to move to the 50,000 case forecast of a month ago, so over the weekend Bolivia fumigated itself. Dr Morales himself was out there with smoker and facemask in the Trinidad region, but we're going to leave the quote to Ruben Costas, prefect of Santa Cruz (the most affected area) and arch-political enemy of Morales (and we're talking up to and including the brains behind last year's aborted coup attempt).

Costas actually managed to say something sensible, and your humble correspondent is happy to agree with the guy for a change. Costas said:

"Today we forget any differences; today we are concerned with our people, with health and this is important. Today we join together our forces."

"....when the health of our population is in risk, anything else becomes secondary. Today is a day of cleanliness, today is day to be conscious that we must fight against this plague."

Which goes to show that redeeming qualities can be found in anyone if circumstances dictate. By the way and to wrap up, this year's dengue outbreak has been worst in Bolivia, but Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina and Peru have all recorded cases. An illness that knows no political boundaries is something to think on, is it not?

Dengue Fever

Dengue does lowland Bolivia and threatens Amazon basin Peru.

• In 2007 it was Paraguay, with at least 27,000 cases (possibly 50% more) and close to 100 deaths.
• In 2008 Brazil was the recipient, with 23,555 reported cases and 30 deaths.
• This time around it's Bolivia and Peru.

Lowland Bolivia has already reported 9,000 cases of dengue (including six deaths), a really nasty fever transported by a specific type of day-flying mosquito (here's the wiki page if you want to find out more). With the dengue season likely to last a least another six weeks (the season coincides with the hot-wet time of year in the jungle), Bolivian authorities fear that up to 50,000 cases might eventually be reported.

Meanwhile, the Ucuyali region of jungle Peru has just declared a state of emergency to combat dengue, mainly to facilitate the re-stocking of low anti-mosquito supplies in the region.

There is no vaccine for dengue, so if you're thinking of visiting either region in the near future, make sure you're well stocked up with mosquito repellents, people. And don't start blaming Evo Morales for this one, please, as it's bad enough already without layering stupidity on top.