Pursuits
African Virus Outbreak in Caribbean Prompts Warnings
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The first known outbreak of the chikungunya virus in the Western Hemisphere has Caribbean governments working to prevent the disease from spreading and damaging the region’s tourism-dependent economies.
About 280 cases of chikungunya, which can cause severe joint pain, fever and headaches, have been reported since early December in Dutch and French Saint Martin, Saint Barthelemy, Martinique, Guadeloupe, Dominica, the British Virgin Islands and French Guyana. Officials from Venezuela to the Cayman Islands have warned of the potential for the mosquito-borne virus, first identified from a patient in Tanzania in 1953, to spread. There is no treatment and the illness is rarely fatal.