Serologic reactivity to leptospira and dengue virus of febrile patients from Guayaquil slums.

Description: Leptospirosis is a zoonosis that occurs throughout the world but is most commonly seen in tropical climates (1). It has risen as a globally important infectious disease as shown in some reports and studies from outbreaks like the 1995 Nicaragua epidemic of severe pulmonary haemorrhage syndrome (SPHS)(2,3), identification of disease among US inner-city homeless population (1,2), the 1998 Lake Springfield Triathlon (2) and 2000 Borneo Eco-Challenge (2,4). Moreover, it was traditionally thought that leptospirosis is only a major health problem in developing, tropical countries (1,4); however, the disease has been under recognized in urban populations of developed countries as well as in temperate rural regions of the world especially during rainy seasons (1,4, 5). But, the real importance of the disease is the incidence related to the lack of sanitary infrastructure. Additionally poorly understood risk factors, pathogenicity, immunopathology are important factors for mortality associated to the disease (1,5,6). Challenges related to prevention are largely dependent on sanitation measures which may be difficult to implement, especially in developing countries, as our country Ecuador (1,6).