Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Rome (Agenzia Fides) - Epidemiologists and paediatricians call it the “democratic virus” because it strikes in rich and poor countries alike, killing children in Africa and Asia and also in the West. A mutable virus and for many years, since its discovery in 1973, hunted by the experts: the rotavirus is responsible for the most serious and contagious forms of diarrhoea in children. Every year it kills 600,000 of the world’s children: one every minute.
Naturally the danger of dying of gastro-enteritis is greater in developing countries, one in every 300 cases, but Western children also die of rotavirus, in Italy about ten die every year. The hospital admission rate is high: in Europe, one out of every 50 children is hospitalised for this pathology in the first five years of life.
According to the World Health Organisation in 2003 diarrhoea was one of the principal causes of death among children (17%) after malnutrition (53%) and pneumonia (19%), followed by malaria (8%) and measles (4%).
The problem is that it is impossible to foresee how the pathology will evolve or which children will be affected by the most serious form. In fact apparently mild forms can instead prove to be lethal . (AP) (17/6/2006 Agenzia Fides; Righe:20; Parole:224)
