Early action might have prevented SFTS in Korea

On May 2^nd, Korea Centers for Disease Control & Prevention announced that mites infected with severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS) live in Korea. After 19 days, first casualty was reported. He got bitten by a bug on August; however, proper prescription was not given to him as the doctor had not enough knowledge on SFTS. His family requested for examination on August, but the request was rejected. There is no vaccine for SFTS, so early action is very important. If the Korea Centers for Disease Control & Prevention aggressively announced the danger of SFTS, those casualties might have been prevented.

SFTS is a hot issue in Korea these days. I totally agree that the Korea Centers for Disease Control & Prevention should have done a better job whenever I read an article on casualty. I heard that there were several suspected cases, but the fact that there was no official explanation seems to me that the ministry was not responsible. I hope that this SFTS issue raises an importance of early action and I also hope that someday, vaccines for SFTS are discovered so that SFTS is no longer exist. This article gave me a chance to think the impact of virus on humans, how they make us feel fearful, especially when there are no vaccines for it.

 

Yeom, Jieun. Early action might have prevented SFTS in Korea. Nate News. 26 May, 2013. Web. 26 May, 2013. http://news.nate.com/view/20130526n04888?mid=n0400