{"id":17934,"date":"2024-12-07T09:02:39","date_gmt":"2024-12-07T10:02:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=17934"},"modified":"2024-12-07T10:23:26","modified_gmt":"2024-12-07T10:23:26","slug":"in-congo-a-medical-mystery-offers-clues-to-the-mpox-epidemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=17934","title":{"rendered":"In Congo, a Medical Mystery Offers Clues to the Mpox Epidemic"},"content":{"rendered":"
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On Sept. 30, 2023, an anxious father brought his 5-year-old son to the hospital in Kamituga, a muddy, bustling town carved out of the thick forest in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. The boy had a high fever and oozing sores on his torso and face.<\/p>\n

Nurses diagnosed chickenpox. They admitted him to the pediatric ward, part of a sprawl of low-slung brick buildings that date to the colonial era, and tried to manage his fever.<\/p>\n

Days passed, and the child\u2019s health did not improve. His fever climbed higher, the lesions spread, blistering even the soles of his small feet.<\/p>\n

Perplexed, the pediatric staff called Dr. Steeve Bilembo, who was managing urgent care. He and a trusted nurse colleague, Fid\u00e8le Kakemenge, examined the boy and named, and then quickly eliminated, possibilities: Not chickenpox, not measles, not rubella, not a bad case of dermatitis \u2014 he would be improving by now if he had any of those ailments.<\/p>\n

The spreading sores meant it wasn\u2019t malaria or typhoid or cholera, the diseases afflicting other children in the crowded ward.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then at one point, we said, \u2018Could it be mpox?\u2019\u201d Dr. Bilembo recounted. \u201cAlthough we have never seen it \u2014 only in books.\u201d<\/p>\n

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On Sept. 30, 2023, an anxious father brought his 5-year-old son to the hospital in Kamituga, a muddy, bustling town carved out of the thick forest in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. The boy had a high fever and oozing sores on his torso and face.Nurses diagnosed chickenpox. They admitted him to the pediatric ward, part of a sprawl of low-slung brick buildings that date to the colonial era, and tried to manage his fever.Days passed, and the child\u2019s health did not improve. His fever climbed higher, the lesions spread, blistering even the soles of his small feet.Perplexed, the pediatric staff called Dr. Steeve Bilembo, who was managing urgent care. He and a trusted nurse colleague, Fid\u00e8le Kakemenge, examined the boy and named, and then quickly eliminated, possibilities: Not chickenpox, not measles, not rubella, not a bad case of dermatitis \u2014 he would be improving by now if he had any of those ailments.The spreading sores meant it wasn\u2019t malaria or typhoid or cholera, the diseases afflicting other children in the crowded ward.\u201cAnd then at one point, we said, \u2018Could it be mpox?\u2019\u201d Dr. Bilembo recounted. \u201cAlthough we have never seen it \u2014 only in books.\u201dWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17936,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17934"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17934\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17937,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17934\/revisions\/17937"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}