What does variola minor mean?
What does variola minor mean?
Medical Definition of variola minor : a mild form of smallpox of low mortality. — called also alastrim, amaas.
What is variola major and minor?
Smallpox is caused by 1 of 2 closely related strains: variola major and variola minor. The 2 viruses are indistinguishable except by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing. Variola minor infection (known as Alastrim) causes fewer systemic symptoms, a less extensive rash, less scarring, and fewer fatalities.
Is smallpox variola major or minor?
Smallpox is broadly classified into major smallpox (variola major) and minor smallpox (variola minor), reflecting clinical features and disease severity, with subcategories in each. – 30%: semi-confluent to confluent skin lesions, often with desquamation. Patients often remain ill, even after lesions have crusted.
Is variola major or minor worse?
Classification. There are two forms of the smallpox virus. Variola major is the severe and most common form, with a more extensive rash and higher fever. Variola minor is a less common presentation, causing less severe disease, typically discrete smallpox, with historical death rates of 1% or less.
What happened to the variola virus?
Thanks to the success of vaccination, the last natural outbreak of smallpox in the United States occurred in 1949. In 1980, the World Health Assembly declared smallpox eradicated (eliminated), and no cases of naturally occurring smallpox have happened since.
What type of virus is variola?
The variola virus is a large, brick-shaped, double-stranded DNA virus that serologically cross-reacts with other members of the poxvirus family, including ectromelia, cowpox, monkeypox, vaccinia, and camelpox. Unlike other DNA viruses, the variola virus multiplies in the cytoplasm of parasitized host cells.
What causes variola virus?
The variola virus causes smallpox. In the past, people spread smallpox most commonly through direct, prolonged face-to-face contact with others. When they sneezed or coughed, they would send respiratory particles through the air. When other people inhaled these large droplets, they would become infected.
Where does variola virus come from?
The phylogenetic and evolutionary studies of the genetic structures of orthopoxviruses that involved the historical records and epidemiological data suggest that VARV is a relatively young virus that emerged approximately 3000 to 4000 years ago in the east of Africa [30,41,42,44].
Where did the variola virus come from?