Not Only Corona, These Are 5 Types of Diseases Caused by Viruses

• 07 Mar
• 2022

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Not Only Corona, These Are 5 Types of Diseases Caused by Viruses

• Article
• By Uswah Sahal
• Covid-19
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Corona Virus Disease (COVID-19) is one of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) which first appeared in Wuhan, China in December 2019. The emergence of a new variant of the SARS-COV-2 type has made the world struggle and facing herd immunity throughout 2019 until now.

In general, the emergence of viruses brings more harm than good. Viruses are responsible for many diseases that affect humans, including animals and plants.

Diah Priyantini Lecturer at the Faculty of Health Sciences (FIK) Muhammadiyah University of Surabaya (UM Surabaya) explained that several diseases caused by viruses are also important to pay attention to and prevent their transmission.

"The first disease caused by a virus is the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) or a virus caused by Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome," said Diah Monday (7/2/22

Diah explained that HIV appeared since 1981 which was found in five homosexual men in Los Angeles, United States. Despite the high number of cases unlike the COVID-19 virus, HIV has infected around 40.1 million people worldwide, especially in vulnerable population groups such as injecting drug users, homosexuals, unprotected heterosexuals and transmission from mother to child.

"Individuals who are already infected with HIV must take antiretroviral drugs throughout their lives in order to keep down the amount of virus (viral load) in the body and not cause a decrease in body immunity," he explained again.

Diah further explained that another disease caused by a virus is dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF), which is caused by the dengue virus and is spread by a vector, namely the Aides Aegypti mosquito.

"During the pandemic, almost all the media covered COVID-19, even though DHF cases also contributed to very high cases in Indonesia, especially in children," he explained.

Families with low knowledge and who do not immediately take their children to the hospital to get help can cause children to be in a critical phase and cannot be handled, as a result, children fall into a state of dehydration and shock which can lead to death.

“Besides HIV and DHF, other viral diseases are hepatitis, which is a viral infection of the human liver. Hepatitis consists of hepatitis types A, B, C, D and E and varies in severity," he said.

Hepatitis A and E can transmit the virus through saliva and food, so that this disease will spread more quickly in Islamic boarding schools, schools and places to eat with poor sanitation, so that it has the potential to spread the virus.

Whereas hepatitis B, C and D are transmitted through contact with body fluids and blood, although it requires direct contact through fluids, the spread of the virus cannot be underestimated either, because if this disease becomes chronic it will cause serious liver damage, can develop into cirrhosis of the liver or heart cancer.

Diseases caused by viruses that pregnant women must watch out for are TORCH (Toxoplasma, Rubella, Citomegalovirus and Herpes Simplex). Pathogens which are viruses are Rubella, Citomegalovirus and herpes simplex, while toxoplasma is a parasite.

TORCH infection should be watched out for by pregnant women, because it can cause the growth of the baby in the womb to be disrupted, as a result when the baby is born it will be abnormal, the baby is born prematurely, the baby is low birth weight (LBW), there are congenital defects, congenital diseases and various other disorders, the worst thing is the death of babies and mothers who miscarry.

“The last thing to watch out for is rabies, or a disease caused by a virus that is transmitted from dogs through bites, scratches or saliva. Apart from dogs, animals that can also carry the rabies virus and transmit it to humans include monkeys, cats, civets and rabbits,” Diah explained again.

At the end of his statement he advised to be aware of various diseases caused by viral infection pathogens whose impact and severity are the same as COVID-19. So it is important to maintain health protocols as a means of breaking the chain of spread of the virus is the most useful promotive effort to prevent disease.