Fifty typhus cases a year

An average of 50 cases of typhus are notified to the Health Department every year as the department's pest control unit does its utmost to keep the island's rat population in check.

A consultant specialist emphasised the need for awareness among the public since the incidence of typhus in Malta remains rather high.

Murine typhus is spread typically through a flea biting a rodent carrying the bacterial-like infection called Rickettsia typhi, which then contaminates human flesh.

Transmission typically occurs after contamination of the flea bite site or other skin wound with flea faeces infected with rickettsia.

According to Emanuel Farrugia, consultant physician and nephrologist, most people do not even know they are infected until they fall ill after an incubation period of one to two weeks.

Typhus is normally marked by high fever, intense headache and, in half of the cases, a rash in the trunk. "Unless proven otherwise, we take such symptoms to mean the patient is effected by typhus," Dr Farrugia said.

Although typhus can be easily treated, a delay in presentation or failure to diagnose it at once may cause potential problems, he warned.

The symptoms may appear from one to two weeks after the flea bite, usually within 12 days.

Fewer than 10 per cent of murine typhus cases require intensive care unit management and the fatality rate is very low.

Specific antibiotics such as doxycycline, tetracycline and chloramphenicol may be prescribed by a doctor to treat typhus which may afflict a person only once in a lifetime.

Dr Farrugia believes that the index of suspicion in Malta is high, which means GPs are very aware of the condition and are quick to prescribe the required antibiotics. All cases of typhus need to be notified to the health authorities.

Doctors normally take more than one test because the first examination could easily result negative since the antibody may develop after 10 days or so.

Dr Farrugia said typhus was more prevalent in the summer and autumn months and he urged the public to avoid areas susceptible to rodents, although infected fleas could be present everywhere.

The pest control unit, pertaining to the environmental health unit, is busy scouring the island eradicating rodents.

The statistics are nothing short of surprising. The unit dealt with a total of 534 complaints between January and June with the largest number coming from St Paul's Bay, followed by Qormi.

In the same six months, over 15,000 rodenticide packets were distributed for free to the public either from the pest control section office at Luqa or from the regional health offices.

Principal health inspector Charles Bonnici said the main objective of the unit was to maintain the rat and mice population at an acceptable level.

Another service provided by the section to achieve its objective is the placing of baits in open spaces, rubble walls and fields and also by carrying out treatment of the main sewerage system.

Nearly 93,000 baits were laid during the six-month period!