Chicken Pox Essay, Research Paper

Chickenpox

Chickenpox is a very mild disease and it isn?t very harmful. You will need to know some things about the disease like: what it is, how you can get it, where it is located on the body, what treatments are used to cure it, who can get it, how and if it can be prevented, and what the long-term effects are and if it is life-threatening. You may already know about chickenpox, but you will find out more information as it is being explained in this report.

Chickenpox is a very contagious disease caused by a herpes virus. This herpes virus is called varicella-zoster virus (VZV). VZV can take over nerve cells and go into a dormant or sleeping state. Some years later the person can contract it again, but it will be a more serious disease called shingles.

You can contract chickenpox by breathing in contaminated moisture droplets from the nose, throat, or skin from the infected person. If you come in direct contact from that person you can also get the disease. A person can get chicken pox at any time of the year. Day care centers and schools are places where a child or person are most likely to get chickenpox. Chickenpox shows up as red spots on the skin. It can start out as a mild fever with cold like symptoms, then a rash or red spots, fluid filled blisters, and last crust or scabs.

Chickenpox is not likely to be found inside the body. You will find it all over the skin surface. Chickenpox is known to show up on the skin as red spots. They can be found on your back, arms, legs basically everywhere.

There are many treatments for chickenpox. Some of the treatments may be bed rest, oatmeal baths, and calamine lotion. Calamine lotion is the most common type of treatment for chickenpox. Cool baths and acetaminophen are used to help reduce fever. Acyclovir an antiviral drug can also help the symptoms of this disease.

A lot of people can contract the chickenpox, but mainly children contract it. The U.S. is estimated that about four million people contract the chickenpox every year. This disease is known to be contracted at any age, but children between the ages of two and ten are most likely to get it. 90% of chickenpox cases happen to children under the age of fifteen. If teenager and adults who may develop the disease, may get a more severe case of it.

Infant or children between the ages of twelve months a thirteen years old should get an injection of a weakened live virus vaccine called Varivax. Teens and adults should get two of the same vaccine shots four to eight weeks apart. There is also a vaccine called the Chickenpox vaccine that you may get as a child. So this disease isn?t hereditary.

Most cases of the chickenpox are mild, but some cases may be life threatening. If you have leukemia and you catch the chicken pox you could possibly die. Estimated about nine thousand people in the U.S. go to the hospital each year because of certain complications from the chickenpox. Chickenpox is an ordinarily mild childhood disease and causes fifty to one hundred deaths each year. Adults are more likely to need hospitalized than that of children, and are more likely to die. Some of the complications from chickenpox are strep infections. A strep infection is the most common complication. There are also neurological disorders such as encephalitis. Encephalitis can cause hearing loss, convulsions, hyperactivity, learning disabilities, mental retardation, paralysis, coma, or even death.

So as you can see there is more than you know about chickenpox that have been explained in this paper. Some of the things that surprised me was that you can die from chickenpox. There is probably more information to put in this paper about each of the subjects but you probably learned enough.

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World Book Encyclopedia C-Ch

Copyright 1971

Field Enterprises Educational Corporation

Alvin and Virginia Silverstein and Laura Silverstein Nunn

Copyright 1998

Chicken Pox and Shingles

Enslow Publishers Inc.