By NewsDesk  @bactiman63

In a follow-up on a previous report on yellow fever cases in Venezuela, the World Health Organization (WHO) published some additional details in a Disease Outbreak News release on Wednesday:

Image/CIA

On 1 October 2021, the IHR National Focal Point (NFP) for Venezuela reported seven confirmed human cases of yellow fever which were investigated between 23 and 24 September 2021. All seven cases were confirmed by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) at the Rafael Rangel National Hygiene Institute. Six of the seven reported cases were not vaccinated. Of these, three were asymptomatic and four developed signs and symptoms between 20 to 24 September, all presented fever and one of the cases also presented with a headache, retro ocular pain, arthralgias and a skin rash. The probable location of infection was a rural parish locality, south of the Maturín Municipality in the Monagas State, which is in the northeast region of Venezuela. The first reported case was a young pregnant woman with a history of yellow fever vaccination. Of the remaining six cases, five were male and ranged between 24 and 82 years of age. To date, no deaths have been reported among the confirmed cases.

Additionally, between 11 August and 1 October 2021, 10 epizootics among non-human primates (NHP) were reported in Venezuela as part of the routine national surveillance. Seven epizootics were located in Monagas state (in the municipalities of Maturin and Aguasay (70 km from Maturin municipality) and three in Anzoátegui state (Freites Municipality, 159 km from Maturin municipality). Two of the epizootics were laboratory confirmed by RT-PCR at the National Reference Laboratory (LNR) both reported in Monagas State and eight (five from Monagas and three from Anzoátegui) were confirmed by an epidemiological link (given the time-space relationship with laboratory confirmed epizootics). Confirmed epizootics were identified at 35 km and 150 km from the urban area of Maturín within the state of Monagas.