It is important as a parent for you to understand the facts about chickenpox. For most kids, the chickenpox virus only causes some irritation but for a small minority it can be life threatening.
Chickenpox is a very contagious disease that most children contract during their early years, and this mostly happens in school. It is most common for kids aged between 2 to 8 years to catch the disease due to outbreaks in their school where groups of kids are affected all at the same time, usually in the spring or winter.
When children initially contract chickenpox, they develop a loss of appetite and a mild fever during the first few days. After that the spots appear in the form of small pimple like bumps all over the body, beginning with the scalp, face, and lower torso then spreading all over including arms and legs. The spots come in the form of blisters which are filled with fluid and are extremely itchy. They later burst, allowing the fluid to drain out and then turn into dry scabs. The disease will usually last only a week to ten days.
Generally chickenpox is nothing to be too concerned about but sometimes children do get complications. Problems can occur when the child scratches the spots and it bleeds, and if not taken care of and cleaned can result in a bacterial skin infection. More serious side effects can include running a very high temperature or swollen red skin surrounding the blistered spots. You should take your child to a doctor immediately if this were to happen. Children with weaker immune systems are more prone to these complications.
During the course of the virus, there is nothing much you can do as a parent except keeping your child s fever down with paracetamol and applying some calamine lotion onto the blisters to help with the itchy skin. Another way to relieve the itchiness is to get your child to take a warm bath with Pinetarsol oil added. Never use aspirin to lower a fever as it can trigger Reye s syndrome which is rare, but could potentially be fatal. Reye s syndrome is rare, but cases have revealed a connection between children consuming aspirin during a viral illness.
Once contracted, the re occurrence of chickenpox is extremely rare due to the immunity that our bodies develop after experiencing the disease. If there were ever to be a second round, it would usually occur later on in life, due to the dormant virus in our systems becoming reactivated.
If you are worried about your child contracting chickenpox at school, there is a vaccine available but only for children over the age of 9 months. After injection, the vaccine might cause some mild side effects like swelling or mild rashes around the injection point.
On a last note, if you are pregnant and come into contact with the chickenpox disease, you should visit your doctor immediately as it can cause multiple complications to a pregnancy.
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