I’ve long heard that adults who get the (once) common childhood diseases like measles, mumps, chicken pox, etc., run the risk of some serious complications.
What sorts of complications could arise from measles, specifically? Feel free to postulate a worst-case scenario.
From Wiki:
Complications with measles are relatively common, ranging from relatively mild and less serious diarrhea, to pneumonia and encephalitis (subacute sclerosing panencephalitis), corneal ulceration leading to corneal scarring. Complications are usually more severe amongst adults who catch the virus.
They’re not common, but can be deadly serious.
Pneumonia - secondary bacterial or (secondary) viral
Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) - this is a bad news syndrome that kills about 1 in 5 of those who get it, and leaves most of the survivors with permanent neurologic disability such as seizures, personality change, behavioural disorders, and IQ drop. In the acute stage of ADEM, these same symptoms are often present along with confusion, paralysis, severely impaired coordination (ataxia), loss of bowel and bladder control . . .
(Subacute Sclerosing Pan-Encephalitis can develop many years later, usually in people who were kids when they had measles)
:smack: Man, the one time I don’t check there first.
Thanks, y’all.
Huh… I guess this is what Polly had, in The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew (a children’s book from about 1890 that I devoured, repeatedly, as a child). It was the first I’d ever heard that measles could cause blindness.
wrong thread