Half of world’s population at risk for dengue, says WHO

MANILA, Philippines - Almost half of the world’s population is now at risk of contracting dengue, which the World Health Organization (WHO) considers as a “major international public health concern.”

The WHO said “the incidence of dengue has grown dramatically around the world in recent decades. Over 2.5 billion people – over 40 percent of the world’s population – are now at risk from dengue.”

The health agency also estimates that there are 50 to 100 million cases of dengue around the world every year.

The WHO said that the transmission of the mosquito-borne disease has increased predominantly in urban and semi-urban areas in recent years until it has become a major health concern.

Severe dengue (previously known as dengue hemorrhagic fever) was first recognized in the 1950s in the Philippines and Thailand. Today, the illness affects most Asian and Latin American countries and has become a “leading cause of hospitalization and deaths among children in these regions,” the WHO said.

Only nine countries had experienced severe dengue epidemics before 1970. But now, the disease is endemic in more than 100 countries in Africa, the Americas, Eastern Mediterranean, Southeast Asia and Western Pacific.

However, the Americas, Southeast Asia and Western Pacific are the “most seriously affected.”

WHO said that cases across the Americas, Southeast Asia and Western Pacific have exceeded 1.2 million in 2008 and over 2.3 million in 2010.

The agency warned that “not only is the number of cases increasing as the disease spreads to new areas, but explosive outbreaks are occurring.”

“Threat of a possible outbreak of dengue fever now exists in Europe and local transmission of dengue was reported for the first time in France and Croatia in 2010, and cases were detected in three other European countries,” the agency said.

“In 2012, an outbreak of dengue on Madeira islands of Portugal resulted in over 2 000 cases and imported cases were detected in 10 other countries in Europe apart from mainland Portugal,” the agency noted.

This year, cases have also occurred in Florida in the United States and Yunnan province of China while the disease “continues to affect” several central American countries like Honduras, Costa Rica and Mexico.

“In Asia, Singapore has reported an increase in cases after a lapse of several years, and outbreaks have also been reported in Laos,” the WHO added.