Five Horses Diagnosed With West Nile Virus in S Cyprus

The department said that all five horses “come from the same premises”, and that all five remain alive, but have exhibited symptoms including a fever and weakness while walking, though those symptoms are said to have waned in recent days.

“The first examination was carried out due to symptoms developed by one of the animals and the second in the context of an epidemiological investigation,” it said, before adding that the virus cannot be directly transmitted from horse to human, or from horse to horse.

Instead, it said, the virus can only be transmitted, both to horses and to humans, by infected mosquitoes.

‘Most often the result of bites from infected mosquitoes’

The World Health Organisation says that human infection of West Nile virus is “most often the result of bites from infected mosquitoes”. 

“Mosquitoes become infected when they feed on infected birds, which circulate the virus in their blood for a few days. The virus eventually gets into the mosquito’s salivary glands. During later blood meals (when mosquitoes bite), the virus may be injected into humans and animals, where it can multiply and possibly cause illness,” it said.

It said that West Nile virus is asymptomatic in around 80 per cent of cases, but that the remaining 20 per cent of cases develop “West Nile fever”.

Symptoms of West Nile fever, it said, include “fever, headache, tiredness, and body aches, nausea, vomiting, occasionally with a skin rash … and swollen lymph glands”.

It said that in the most severe cases, people can develop encephalitis or meningitis, with symptoms including “headache, high fever, neck stiffness, stupor, disorientation, coma, tremors, convulsions, muscle weakness, and paralysis”.

One in roughly 150 people infected with West Nile virus develop “a more severe form of the disease”, according to the World Health Organisation.

“Serious illness can occur in people of any age, however people over the age of 50 and some immunocompromised persons … are at the highest risk for getting severely ill when infected,” it said.

Source: Cyprus Mail