We learn: Mother and son contracted measles, new cases of the disease in Belgrade

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Two new cases of measles have been confirmed in Belgrade. We have learned that these are a mother (48) and a son (4).

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As we were told at the Institute of Public Health in Belgrade, the child was not vaccinated with the MMR vaccine, while the mother was.

The mother has a mild clinical picture of the disease.

There are now a total of 8 cases of measles diagnosed in Belgrade, and one in Novi Sad.

Three more cases were confirmed in Belgrade yesterday, a 4-year-old boy, an 18-year-old man and a 48-year-old woman. The young man was hospitalized at the Clinic for Infectious and Tropical Diseases of the University Clinical Center of Serbia due to pneumonia.

The first case of measles this season was confirmed in Serbia on February 6 in a boy whose mother first contracted the disease abroad.

Measles are transmitted by direct contact with an infected person - through kissing, shaking hands, through the air with respiratory droplets emitted during coughing and sneezing, and rarely indirectly through freshly contaminated objects.

"The incubation, the period from the moment the virus enters the body to the manifestation of the disease, i.e. the onset of symptoms in measles lasts 7 to 18 days. After that, there is increased body temperature, nasal discharge, cough and conjunctivitis - watery, red eyes, swollen eyelids.

These symptoms last 2 to 4 days, after which there is a jump in body temperature, over 40 degrees and the appearance of a rash first on the face, behind the ears and on the neck, which then spreads to the rest of the body," the Institute of Public Health in Belgrade explained for Telegraf.

An infected person is contagious on the last day of incubation, while still without symptoms, 4 days before the outbreak of measles and 4 days after.

"Complications are more common in children under the age of 5 and adults over the age of 20. These are pneumonia, inflammation of the middle ear, diarrhea, inflammation of the brain and loss of vision. Pneumonia occurs in one in 20 patients, and about 60 percent of deaths occur precisely because of this complication. One in 1,000 patients gets inflammation of the brain, while one in 1,000 patients with this complication dies," the Institute told Telegraf.rs.

(Telegraf.rs)