The painful skin and nerve disorder, shingles, is caused
by a re-awakened chickenpox virus (medically, the varicella-zoster virus, VZV).
Before the introduction of the two-dose chickenpox vaccine, Varivax, in the
early 1990s, almost everyone contracted the itchy pustular contagion during
infancy or childhood. Nowadays, clinical chickenpox is highly unusual, outside
of those pockets of vaccine denial becoming (unfortunately) more commonplace
due to superstitious fears. Fortunately, we now (since 2006) have a vaccine to
protect specifically against shingles: Zostavax. But it is being widely
ignored.
Shingles occurs many years later in some people who have
had prior VZV infection; no one knows precisely why some are susceptible, but
the incidence of shingles increases dramatically with age,
especially after age 60. While the condition is somewhat similar,
clinically, to chickenpox, in that it causes painfully itchy blisters surrounded
by a red rash, shingles is unique in that the inflammation travels along a
nerve route (dermatome), running for example from the cervical root in the neck
down the arm. It can involve just about any nerve in the body, and when it
affects the ophthalmic nerve (in the eye), it can cause visual impairment and
even painful corneal ulcers…..To Read More….
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