West Nile Virus season (July-August) is upon us once again. As I became deathly ill last summer from this virus and its accompanying issues, please take the time to read this and protect yourself and your family from it.
I was bitten by an infected mosquito in my bedroom while sleeping. My former roommate was a smoker and kept vampire hours. As he was only allowed to smoke outside on the balcony, he would often open and close the patio door several times throughout the night. One morning in late August, I awoke to find that I’d been bitten more than fifteen times on my legs in the night.
For the following week, I felt just kind of generally blah. Tired, irritable…but functioning. Then, about five days later, I got a very strange rash on my chest, arms and neck. It didn’t itch, but was not pretty. I went online to try and figure out what I might have, and found that I was in the last stages of West Nile. The red rash is pretty much the last symptom of the illness.
Not everyone gets ill from contracting the virus. However, several months earlier, my appendix had burst. Because of the residual bacteria lurking in my organs from that nuclear appendectal episode, my immune system was already strained to its limits. Then the subsequent West Nile wiped out the rest of my immunities, leaving me vulnerable to any opportunistic virus.
On the sixth day after being bitten, I fell ill with the worst fever/headache I’d ever experienced. I did not suspect West Nile, for I thought I had already passed the stage where infection was a possibility. I was bedridden with this debilitating headache and fever for three days before I could reach a mental state that allowed me to realize that I wasn’t getting better. I was getting worse. Much worse.
No one had warned me that the same mosquitoes that carry West Nile also carry meningitis.
I was taken into the E.R. on the seventh day. I had lost all control of my motor functions on the left side of my body, my vision, and was hallucinating wildly. The hospital managed to control the fever, which was pushing 106 degrees, but couldn’t seem to get the other problems under control easily. So they transported me to another hospital that specialized in infectious diseases.
There, I was quarantined in a negative-flow room to insure that the air I breathed was not released into the general population. Everyone who had interaction with me had to wear a self-contained full-body suit. They weren’t able to diagnose my illness. The doctors did several spinal taps, but nothing showed up in the fluid. Hence the quarantine.
In the meantime, I was miserable. Vomiting, headache, body tremors and spasms, severe pain, high fever…it was horrid. Finally, after several hours, they did manage to isolate the West Nile which had started all of this, leading to spinal meningitis and encephalitis (swelling of the brain). Because of the prolonged exposure to these, I was left with some very serious neurological after-symptoms.
I lost pretty much all of my short-term memory, and could not form any new memories. I forgot my dog’s names, the names of objects…all of it. My vision was off, as I “saw” things out of the edge of my eyes that weren’t there. Walking was a problem, as my navigation skills were gone…so I couldn’t drive or ride the bus, for the motion made me very nauseous.
In the numerous follow-up visits to specialists of all kinds, I learned that the aftereffects of the illness could last up to three years. (!) However, I was incredibly fortunate. For whatever reasons, my immune system recovered pretty quickly. I went on an intensive regimen of Eastern herbs and supplements. The staff at the Center for Infectious Diseases in Boulder remarked that I had recovered from the first wave of the illness faster than any of their patients they’d treated since the disease made its presence known in 2003. I was Case #5 in Boulder County where I live.
From that point, almost exactly a year ago, it has taken a lot of effort and concentration to regain some of the body-functions I took for granted previously, such as vision, motor skills, and most importantly, memory. The whole ordeal ended up costing me more than $100,000 in medical bills. Thankfully, I had insurance, and so my portion was considerably less…but it wasn’t like I had money just hanging around waiting for such a cataclysmic event. I nearly lost my job because I couldn’t concentrate on my duties.
Several victims of this illness ended up unemployed and homeless because of the often misunderstood aftereffects of this virus. It’s not like the flu, where you get it and then get over it. The disease stays with you for a long, long time. It’s effects are different for each person.
The moral of my tale is this: with just a few easy preventative measures, you can avoid this illness and its sometimes deadly companion illnesses.
-Minimize your time outdoors between dusk and dawn, when mosquitoes are most prevalent. Even though you don’t THINK you’ll get bitten by an infected mosquito, it will happen the more chances you take.-Wear insect repellent no matter when you’re outdoors. Mosquitoes feed at all hours of the day and night in certain areas.
-Wear long sleeves and long pants whenever possible or feasible. Protect all exposed skin.-The illness has been fatal in children and adults over the age of 50. Take special care with family members who fall into those age ranges.
-Repair any torn or damaged window and door screens. This one is especially important, because infected mosquitoes can bite you in your home.
-Eliminate any potential breeding areas for mosquitoes. Get rid of ANY standing water.
-Report any mosquito swarms to your local government or health agency.
-Educate yourself on the illness, how to treat it, and what to look for.
There is no cure for West Nile Virus. The medical industry isn’t sure at this time whether a person who has contracted the virus can get it a second or third time, but they’re pretty sure you can’t. However, once is enough. If you have a couple hundred thousand dollars sitting around, you like having spinal taps done repeatedly on you, or you just plain enjoy being really, really sick, then ignore everything I’ve stated here. Otherwise, you owe it to yourself and your family to protect yourself.
