The Spaniards fear the resurgence of a disease they believed to have eradicated for nearly thirty years. The first case of diphtheria since 1985, an infectious disease of the respiratory tract, was observed in a six-year-old child in the town of Olot in Catalonia. He is currently hospitalized in serious condition in the intensive care unit at Vall d’Hebron Hospital in Barcelona. The boy’s parents had decided not to have him vaccinated, despite the free vaccination devices.
The boy took part in a school trip shortly before reporting the first symptoms of the infection. 150 people were reportedly in contact with the young patient and were taken care of by doctors.
The child is treated with an antitoxic drug, a product that was imported from Russia. Treatment was indeed difficult to find in Spain since no case had been reported in the country for 30 years. “We believe the bacteria come from someone living abroad where there have already been cases of diphtheria,” a Spanish doctor told Euronews.
Diphtheria is an infectious disease which can lead to paralysis of the central nervous system or of the diaphragm and throat, leading to death by asphyxiation, recalls the Institut Pasteur. Infection with C. diphtheriae bacteria is highly contagious and is transmitted through the air. It most commonly appears as diphtheria angina and results in pharyngitis, fever, neck swelling, and headache.
A rising debate
This first case of diphtheria in Spain in an unvaccinated child should fuel the controversy around the phenomenon of “anti-vacccins”, these people in Europe, especially in the United States who choose to oppose the compulsory vaccination. A debate that resonates in French news with the recent controversy over the Professor Joyeux’s anti-vaccine petition.
In Europe, nearly 90% of Europeans are vaccinated against diphtheria. In France, vaccination is compulsory for all children and health professionals. The last reported case of diphtheria in mainland France dates back to 1989.
>> To read also:Petition from Prof. Joyeux about the DT-Polio vaccine: beware of the arguments put forward
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