2023 AP Select an infectious disease and research the CDC website for information about the disease its natural history presenting symptoms

AP

Select an infectious disease and research the CDC website for information about the disease, its natural history, presenting symptoms, and outbreak characteristics. Identify an occurrence of the disease by searching the Internet for recent reports of this disease and compare that episode or occurrence with information from the CDC website.

Acute flaccid myelitis (AFM) is a rare infectious disease that affects the nervous system. The disease cause inflammation to spinal cord predominantly the gray matter, which cause the muscles and reflexes in the body to become weak. According to CDC, there are several probable causes of AFM such as, viruses like  poliovirus and non-polio enteroviruses, West Nile virus, and adenoviruses environmental toxins and genetic disorders.

The symptoms present with sudden onset of upper and lower extremities weakness, loss of muscle tone and reflexes. Some people will also experience facial drooping, ptosis, difficulty moving the eyes, slurred speech, difficulty swallowing, pain in the extremities, and inability to urinate. The most severe affect is respiratory failure.

According to CDC, from August 2014 through September 2018 there’s been a total of 386 confirmed cases, mostly cases involve children. Currently for 2018 with presenting onset of symptoms for September to October 16,2018; there are 62 confirmed cases in 22 state in the U.S.The patients’ symptoms have been most similar to complications of infection with certain viruses, including poliovirus, non-polio enteroviruses, adenoviruses, and West Nile virus. The diagnostic test ran all AFM cases have tested negative for poliovirus. “The increase in AFM cases in 2014 coincided with a national outbreak of severe respiratory illness among people caused by enterovirus D68 (EV-D68). Among the people confirmed with AFM, CDC did not consistently detect EV-D68 in every patient (Acute Flaccid Myelitis, 2018).