Seroprevalence of dengue viral infection in patients attending to tertiary care hospital during covid-19 pandemic

Author: 
Kiranjeet Kaur and Aditi Goyal

Introduction: Co-infection and co-occurrence of Covid-19 and dengue have introduced a significant burden on healthcare systems in dengue-endemic regions10. The complexity of diverse disease severities, prolonged infectious periods, and shared clinical manifestations and pathogenesishave made their diagnosis, treatment, and resource allocation challenging, particularly in developing countries in Asia with high prevalence of dengue and other arboviruses. Aim: To assess seroprevalence of dengue viral infection in patients attending to tertiary care hospital during covid-19 pandemic. Material and methods: All blood samples tested collected from clinically suspected dengue were tested by rapid qualitative immunochromatographic assay for differential detection of Dengue Virus (DENV) NS1 antigen, DENV specific IgM and IgG antibodies and the rapid detection of Dengue infection was performed by commercially available kits. Results: During the study period of one year, a total 703 samples from suspected dengue patients were tested for dengue NS1, IgM and IgG serology of which 151(21.5%) samples were positive. Primary dengue infection seen among 141(93.4%), secondary dengue infection among 6(4.0%) and old dengue infection was seen among 4(2.6%). Co-infection of dengue was reported among 4(2.6%) patients who were Covid positive. Conclusion: This pandemic has further exacerbated the burden in tropical and subtropical regions of the world, where dengue fever is already endemic to the population. Similar clinical manifestations shared by COVID 19 have raised concerns especially in dengue endemic countries with limited resources leading to diagnostic challenges.

Page: 
6013-6015
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DOI: 
http://dx.doi.org/10.24327/23956429.ijcmpr2021101065
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