August 27, 2010 Honduras 2010 © Juan Carlos Tomasi Due to an
alarming increase in cases of dengue fever in Honduras this
year, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has
launched an emergency intervention in Tegucigalpa, the capital,
where the majority of cases have been reported. MSF is
supporting local health services with a three-pronged approach
that focuses on medical care, vector control, and community
education. This sort of intervention to a dengue outbreak is
relatively new for MSF, but the organization has already set up
an emergency pediatric unit and treated more than 80 children.
Mobile teams are also working with the local health authorities
to identify and eliminate sources of infection in 4,400
households in the Tegucigalpa area. Dengue, which is endemic in
Central America, is a viral disease transmitted by mosquitoes of
the genus Aedes. Symptoms are similar to flu; they include
headaches, fever, nausea, abdominal pain, and skin rashes. The
most severe form, dengue hemorrhagic