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Taipei, July 26 (CNA) A woman living in New Taipei has been diagnosed with chikungunya fever, the first indigenous case in Taiwan's history, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said Friday.
The 20-year-old patient had not traveled abroad before the onset of symptoms such as fever, joint pain, headache and rash on July 21, said the director. CDC deputy general, Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥).
The patient is currently recovering at home, where she is isolated from others, said Chuang, who said that none of the people who had contact with the woman before her isolation had developed suspicious symptoms.
According to the CDC, the woman lives in a neighborhood where foreign migrant workers congregate frequently.
The patient was remembered to have been bitten by mosquitoes during outdoor activities in the neighborhood, which led the CDC to wonder if there were imported cases. hidden mosquito-borne disease in this region, said Chuang.
"The virus will remain in the body of a mosquito a few days after it has bitten an infected person," he explained.
Like dengue, chikungunya is transmitted by mosquitoes carrying the virus and has an incubation period of two to twelve days. Also like dengue, symptoms of chikungunya include the sudden onset of fever, headache, joint and muscle pain, nausea and fatigue, according to Chuang.
About half of those infected with chikungunya will develop a rash on the body, said Chuang, but said that patients usually recover from the virus.
He stated that most patients were recovering in less than a week and that the mortality rate of the disease was one in 1,000.
There were 17 confirmed cases of chikungunya in Taiwan this year, including 16 imported cases, the highest number ever recorded in the first seven months of the year in Taiwan.
Six came from Myanmar, four from the Maldives, two from Indonesia and one from Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and India, said Chuang.
(By Chang Ming-hsuan and Elizabeth Hsu)
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