1.
Zika virus is similar to Dengue, Yellow fever, Japanese encephalitis and West Nile viruses (WNS). Zika virus is belongs to a virus family Flaviviridae and the Genus, Flavivirus; which is mainly transmitted by day time-active Aedes mosquitoes, such as Aedes Aegyptic and Aedes Albopictus. Zika virus disease was first reported from the pacific in 2007, followed by in France Polynesia and Brazil in 2013 and 2015 respectively. Zika virus spread through bite of an infected Aedesmosquito, a same mosquito that transmits Dengue and Chikungunya. The virus has also been found in semen, thus sexual transmission is also documented. During the first week of infection, Zika virus can be found in blood and therefore transmitted through mosquito bites. Symptoms of disease mostly begins with mild fever, rash and joint pain or red eyes, followed by muscular pain and headache, within 3 to 12 days after being bitten by an infected mosquito, and persist for a week. Zika virus can also spread from pregnant mother to her unborn baby. In 2014, Brazil reported 147 cases of babies born with shrunken skulls, known as Microcephaly, a congenital deformation of the skull that compresses the infant’s brain. Until now, neither vaccine nor better preventive drug is available, therefore the best way to prevent Zika virus is to avoid mosquito bites whenever traveling to an area where Zika virus is present.
A. Rajendiran*, Praveen Katiyar
*University Institute of Pharmacy, CSJM University, Kanpur, U.P., India
80-84
2.
Context: Vitamin D has emerged as a topic of great interest among researchers. Recent evidence indicates that today the world is facing vitamin D deficiency pandemic. Sensitizing pediatricians to widespread vitamin D deficiency in children and benefits accrued from it’s correction would go a long way as far as clinical practice and public health is concerned.
Evidence Acquisition: We performed a literature search using PubMed/medline, EMBASE and Science Direct databases indexed under the Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) terms; “Vitamin D OR Vitamin D deficiency” combined with the terms “children” OR “pediatric” OR “child health”. The literature search was limited to articles in last 35 years and written in the English language. All articles having direct relevance to the present review were searched. Reference lists of all articles were also reviewed. Emphasis was placed on pediatric literature, although sentinel adult studies relevant to this article have been included. Latest editions of standard texts were also searched.
Results: Vitamin D deficiency is highly prevalent throughout the world including India. Though some evidence suggests a role of hypovitaminosis D in pathophysiology of many clinical situations other than rickets and osteomalacia like autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular diseases, infections, cancers, fetal health, and exercise performance, some authorities feel there is a lack of unequivocal evidence in favour of nonskeletal health benefits of vitamin D.
Conclusions: Widespread subclinical and pre-rachitic vitamin D deficiency in children should be diagnosed by serum 25(OH)D levels and these levels should be maintained above 20 ng/mL to obtain optimal health benefits. There is a need for large randomized clinical trials to investigate the nonskeletal benefits of vitamin D deficiency.
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V. K. TANDON*
*Senior consultant, Chhatrapati Shahu ji Maharaj University, Kanpur
85-92
