The disease called trench fever was diagnosed in a patient in Canada. She had almost disappeared after the First World War.
Trench fever
Tibialgic fever, also known as quintane fever or five-day fever, was a plague suffered by soldiers during World War I and World War II. It is caused by the bacteria Bartonella Quintana, present in particular in the droppings of lice or fleas and had struck a few thousand soldiers during the War between 1914 and 1918. The bacterium is transmitted by arthropod vector, or by body lice. Concretely, it is transmissible to humans through skin breakage, linked to itching and scratching of the skin, soiled by the excrements and bites of infected lice. The incubation period is long, between 14 and 30 days. The clinical signs of the disease appear rather suddenly, such as fever, listlessness, headache accompanied by pain behind the eyes and severe pain in the back and legs. The fever may recur and trench fever can impact the heart, causing endocarditis (inflammation of the heart).
A disease that appears in Canada
It was Dr Carl Boodman of the Winnipeg Hospital who raised the alert recently, as he identified a case of trench fever in a homeless person in Canada. The patient suffered from heart problems. Three other cases were reportedly recorded in the city of Winnipeg, among homeless people. Quintan fever is a disease endemic in other countries, such as Mexico, Tunisia or Poland, but which is reappearing in the homeless population in the United States and recently in Canada. Hygiene conditions are difficult to maintain for a person who lives in the street, which favors the onset of this disease which is supposed to have been eradicated. According to the doctor, the diagnosis is also complicated, because these people have difficulty accessing medical consultations. As Carl Boodman points out, “It’s a wartime disease, a refugee camp disease, and it’s something that industrialized societies continue to have to deal with. […] this reflects the fact that there are still people in our society who live in conditions that we should not tolerate”. In addition, the identification of tibialgic fever is made difficult, as the fever can last for about 5 days, go away, then reappear, in addition to lasting ”weeks and months without really having symptoms“, According to the Doctor. The disease can cause serious complications in the heart, but is not fatal, if it is taken care of. Indeed, it is easily treated with antibiotics.
