Viruela o varicela: Un difícil diagnóstico clínico y de laboratorio

Abstract

Clinical, epidemiological, and laboratory circumstances were the cause of an initially erroneous diagnosis of variola minor in the second half of 1967, when the regional virology laboratory studied an epidemic outbreak of an eruptive disease in a rural community with some industry in which very few smallpox vaccinations had been administered. The disease sharply attacked the adult population and spread to municipalities near the capital of the department of Antioquia, Colombia, which two years earlier, had been protected by a mass vaccination campaign

Recourse to the national reference laboratory and the National Communicable Disease Center of the United States was available in connection with a change in diagnosis, discarding smallpox and adopting chikenpox. This was verified within the framework of the PASB smallpox eradication program, which ensures continous reliability for the diagnosis in the laboratory through dependable tests, and clinically by stressing the different features between smallpox and chickenpox, as shown in photographs used in the continous medical education programs.