West Nile Symptoms

West Nile Virus is a mosquito-borne disease that has started to receive a lot of media coverage in the US from 2001. The first case of West Nile Virus was discovered in the US in 1999. The disease has the potential to kill us human beings as well as animals primarily horses and birds. If you or someone you know is feeling well you may want to consider if you have West Nile symptoms. These symptoms can vary depending on the stage of West Nile Virus that the sufferer is going through. The first stage is asymptomatic which means that the patient has been infected but there is no way to know because the do not feel any negative effects, or any effects at all for that matter.

In about 1 in 5 cases of West Nile Virus, the febrile condition West Nile Fever is suffered. This is an unpleasant illness, characterized by some of the following West Nile symptoms:

• Fever
• Headaches
• Swollen glands
• Heavy Sweating
• Shivers
• Fatigue
• Trunk rash
• Nausea
• Darrhea
• Vomitting
• Lack of hunger

Most of these West Nile symptoms will pass within at most around 10 days although tiredness and fatigue may persist for several weeks, with swollen glands even longer - up to many months after.

In around 1/150 of people who are infected by West Nile Virus go on to suffer from West Nile meningitis or encephalitis. This is a condsiderably more serious disease since it is neuroinvasive (affects the brain) and a small percentage of sufferers die from this strain of the disease. In fact, the statistics show that 1/1000 people who are infected by West Nile Virus will end up dying. The following are some of the West Nile symptoms for WNV meningitis and encephalitis:

• Headaches
• Disorientation
• Reduced consciousness, close to coma
• Paralysis
• Tremors
• Convulsions
• Stiff neck

In very rare cases of encephalitis sufferers have been reported as having spinal chord damage in addition to the West Nile symptoms listed above. Recovery from encephalitis will also be marked by long periods of fatigue.