Puerto Rico declares an epidemic after dengue cases spike. What you need to know.

On Monday, government leaders in Puerto Rico declared a dengue epidemic after a spike in cases of the mosquito-borne disease hit the island.

The Puerto Rico Department of Health said it is working to enhance surveillance, laboratory, vector control and outreach interventions. “The fact that it’s happening now is really kind of a heads up, a warning sign for us. … We’re having introductions of the virus by people traveling, and we’re seeing these outbreaks in Puerto Rico that are out of the season, which are really unusual,” Ko said.a surge in cases in Brazil, causing many states in the South American country to declare a state of emergency.

“It can have a waxing and waning course, but you’re usually talking about a couple of weeks overall where it’s worse in the first week or so, and we start to see some recovery over time,” said Jack C. O’Horo, an infectious-disease physician at the Mayo Clinic.Two vaccines are available for dengue. One is Dengvaxia, developed by Sanofi. The other is Dengue Tetravalent Vaccine, developed by Takeda Pharmaceuticals. Both shots provide protection against all four dengue virus serotypes.

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