Mexico worried by rise in hemorrhagic dengue

A report from the Associated Press :

" MEXICO CITY : Mexico is facing a sort of perfect storm of floods that breed mosquitoes, prompting a big increase in the number of hemorrhagic dengue cases, the country's top epidemiological official said Wednesday.

The disease's Type 2 strain, which makes people who have already had the Type 1 variant more vulnerable to developing the hemorrhagic form, is now in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz and moving north toward the region on the U.S. border.

Type 1 is already present in border states like Tamaulipas, which suffered extensive flooding in the weeks after Hurricane Alex made landfall June 30.

"It is possible, if not this year then next, for (Type 2) to reach Tamaulipas," said Miguel Angel Lezana, director of the National Epidemiological Center.

Veracruz borders Tamaulipas to the south.

Cases of the milder, classic form of dengue fever in Mexico have declined slightly since 2009. But the more serious hemorrhagic form has spiked to about 1,900 cases this year, compared with about 1,430 in the same period of 2009."