Legionnaires are not contagious?

Legionnaire or also known as the Legion Fever is a bacterial disease that causes lung infections or pneumonia. The disease is not contagious (ie can not be transmitted from person to person).






Symptoms of Legionnaires disease 

His first symptoms will appear between 2-10 days after exposure to bacteria. Legionnaires originally a flu-like illness accompanied by fatigue, high fever (often 39.5 ° C or more), headache, muscle aches and dry cough. When pneumonia develops there may be chest pain, shortness of breath, vomiting, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and hallucinations.

There are more than 500 cases yearly in the UK (in 2006 showed 551 cases of Legionnaires' disease reported in England and Wales). Approximately 1-10 cases of these infections have been fatal.

The cause of Legionnaires disease 

Legionnaires caused by a bacterium known as Legionella pneumophila. Disease and the bacteria were found following the outbreak of the American Legion convention in Philadelphia in 1976, that the history of Legionnaire's name.

The bacteria are found widely throughout the natural water systems such as rivers and ponds, but the temperature is essential for growth. Bacteria can grow in warm or hot water from the artificial water systems such as a heater or in a whirlpool that can form a biofilm or a layer of live bacteria.

Other sources include water systems of large buildings, cooling towers of air conditioning systems, fountains and pools, and communal bathrooms.

It used to be that people who contracted Legionella is because they inhale an aerosol mist or water contamination. For a while this may be true in some cases, but now more often the case when Legionella-contaminated water in the mouth (eg drinking water) can pass through the body's normal defenses and pass through the lungs.

This is known as aspiration, and it explains why smokers and those with chronic lung disease are particularly vulnerable to Legionella. Usually the liquid in the mouth is pushed into the throat and into the stomach where each particle, such as bacteria decompose.

But in smokers and those with lung disease or weak antibodies, this mechanism may not work properly and the bacteria can enter more easily into the lungs to form pneumonia.

The appearance is more common in late summer and early fall. The majority of patients with this disease are men than women, especially middle-aged men.

Treatment for Legionnaires disease 

Prompt treatment with effective antibiotics, but the types of antibiotics should be used as the bacteria can hide in cells of the respiratory tract, and antibiotics should be able to penetrate cells.

The risk of getting Legionnaires can be reduced by proper maintenance and cleaning which may become a source of bacterial growth, such as air conditioning systems

BBC/Fit/B21