Measles in Children: Causes, Cures and Remedies.

What is measles?

Measles is an exanthematous disease (i.e. characterized by the appearance of a rash, a rash shaped like spots), which appears mainly between the end of winter and the beginning of spring, and is more frequent between the ages of 3 and 9. age and is extremely contagious: about 90 percent of children exposed to the infection get sick.

According to the provisions of the law of the Ministry of Health, the presence of measles must be notified by the pediatrician to the health authorities and the sick child must be kept in isolation for five days from the appearance of the rash.

In reality, the baby is contagious as early as the seventh day of incubation, when measles symptoms have not yet manifested.

The disease, once contracted, usually confers lifelong immunity.

The causes

Measles is caused by a virus of the Morbillivirus genus, belonging to the Paramixovirus family. Before the arrival of the vaccine, which drastically reduced its incidence, it represented one of the most common infectious diseases of childhood.

How is measles transmitted?

Transmission of the virus occurs through the microscopic droplets of infected secretions that spread through the air when the sick person coughs, sneezes or talks.

Measles is a very contagious disease: the risk begins in the incubation period, that is, before symptoms appear, and continues up to 5 days after the onset of the rash.

Symptoms of measles

The characteristic signs of measles appear, on average, a couple of weeks after the infection. The incubation, which does not present specific symptoms, lasts eight to fifteen days. For the first two to four days, therefore, measles takes on the characteristics of a common cold with:

 dry or catarrhal cough;

 cold;

 fever (even high);

 malaise;

 exhaustion.

Towards the end of this phase, the first symptoms typical of the disease appear, such as:

 conjunctivitis (inflammation of the inner lining of the eyelid and the front of the eye),

 intolerance to light, discomfort and burning in the eyes,

 appearance of whitish spots on the internal mucosa of the mouth (the “Koplik's spots”), which last one to two days and disappear with the appearance of the rash.

The actual exanthematic phase, in which the spots, composed of red dots, typical of measles, spread over the whole body, lasts an average of four to six days. The spots first appear behind the ears, on the neck and face, and also spread to the trunk on the second day and to the legs on the third.

Generally, in the first two to three days the fever tends to rise (it can reach 40 ° C), then it subsides and disappears, while the cough becomes softer. From the fourth to the sixth day, blemishes, such as coughs, also begin to disappear, sometimes leaving the skin peeling. After about another ten days the child recovered.

How to recognize measles?

Measles is not recognized immediately because at the beginning it has generic symptoms that can be confused with those of other flu-like diseases. The first unmistakable symptom is Koplik's whitish spots, which occur inside the mouth on the mucous membrane of the cheeks and palate.

The other characteristic sign is obviously given by the exanthematous spots typical of measles, which appear as soon as Koplik's spots disappear. These are small bright red eruptions, slightly raised, with jagged edges and a diameter ranging from two to 10 millimeters, with a tendency to merge into larger spots.The measles rash appears initially on the neck and face, for then move on to the rest of the body.

Beware of the complications of measles

In about one in six cases, measles can lead to complications such as laryngitis, otitis media (infection of the middle ear beyond the eardrum), diarrhea, and bronchopneumonia (acute inflammation of the bronchi and lungs).

These infections are caused by the measles virus itself or, more often, by the overlap of bacterial infections favored by the weakening of the immune system, that is the natural defense, connected to the disease. To treat these complications, the pediatrician can prescribe a course of antibiotics.

Much more rarely (in about one in a thousand cases) measles can cause encephalitis, a very serious disease that affects the brain (the brain) and can have irreversible consequences. In this case, the child must be hospitalized urgently.

Treatments for measles

Since this is a viral infection, there is no specific cure for measles. The pediatrician can, however, prescribe an antifebril based on paracetamol, if the temperature exceeds 38.5 ° -39 ° C measured in the bottom, and an antihistamine if the itching caused by the exanthema becomes too annoying.

Can it be prevented by vaccination?

Measles vaccination is especially important to avoid the complications that contracting the disease can bring. In fact, in Italy it is one of the compulsory vaccinations. The first dose of the vaccine is given as an injection between 12 and 15 months of age with a booster around 5-6 years.

The vaccine is generally associated with those of mumps, rubella and chicken pox (the so-called "tetravalent" MPRV vaccination).

Advice for parents

To reduce eye discomfort, it may be useful to dim the light in the bedroom and dab the baby's eyes with a sterile gauze soaked in boiled water and left to cool or in physiological solution (water and salt) on sale in pharmacies.

It is necessary to make the child drink a lot, offering him water, chamomile or herbal tea. The high fever exposes him, in fact, to the risk of dehydration. It is also good not to overly cover him and give him cold water sponges on his legs and arms to lower the temperature.