SICKNESS IN INFANTS AND CHILDREN: SCARLET FEVER
This is a streptococcal infection in which the streptococcus makes a poison (scarlet-fever toxin) that causes a scarlet-coloured rash.
At the beginning of scarlet fever, the child feels tired, restless, and irritable. Then he develops a fever and a sore throat, and begins to vomit. The skin feels hot and dry. After a day or so, bright red spots break out, starting in the body creases, such as the armpits. The rash spreads to the neck, the chest, and the back. It may later cover the entire body and, from a distance, look like a uniform coat of redness, except for the skin around the mouth, which stays pale. The tongue becomes inflamed, too (strawberry tongue). After a week or so, peeling of the skin occurs, beginning either where the rash started or with the thinnest skin and ending in areas where the skin is thickest, like the palms of the hands or soles of the feet.
Not only have new medicines reduced the dangers of scarlet fever, but the disease itself has become less severe in the past 20 years.
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