Topic: Correlation between nutritional status and severity of dengue

To what extent is there a correlation between the nutritional status and severity of dengue?
Zain Ahmed

Dengue fever is a viral infection and it is one of the most common diseases in the world,
especially in countries such as India, Pakistan and Indonesia. This disease is caused by the bite
of Aedes mosquitoes. Dengue causes many symptoms in the patients such as headaches,
muscle pain, rashes and nausea. It is estimated that more than 21,000 deaths are caused by this
disease annually. These patients have faced bleeding, thrombocytopenia, and very low blood
pressure levels which lead to these deaths. The spread of dengue fever increased dramatically in
the 1960s. There are many factors which have led to the widespread occurrence of this disease
such as climate change and urbanization. (Heilman, 2014)

Most of the deaths caused by dengue fever take place in countries such as Pakistan, India and
Indonesia, due to the unhygienic conditions in these countries. Poverty is also a serious issue in
these countries which leads to many other problems such as malnutrition and poor physical and
mental health. When people living in these conditions are infected with this disease, the severity
of the disease is much higher due to the weak immunity of the patients and this leads to many
deaths. (Trang, 2016)

To solve and create awareness for this problem, I have chosen the research question “To what
extent is there a correlation between the nutritional status and severity of dengue?” to
investigate the correlation between nutritional status and severity of dengue fever. I am
researching this as many people around me have been infected with this and this has caused
many deaths around my country. My research will help create awareness for this problem so
people can take care of their nutritional values and needs so they do not suffer serious health
issues due to dengue. This research will prove significant as people will take care of their
nutritional status as a precaution against this disease.

To investigate this issue, I will be using several primary and secondary sources to gain
information on this topic. For primary sources, I will be interviewing people who have suffered
from this disease in the past and ask them about their nutritional status before being infected and
how it affected the severity of the disease. I will also be interviewing several doctors who have
treated dengue fever patients and ask them about the correlation between the two variables. I will
also conduct surveys within dengue fever patients and ask them questions about their nutritional
status. For secondary research, I will be reading many online articles and books to come up with
a conclusion for my topic. I will use my findings to find a trend between the severity of the dengue
cases and which social classes the patients belong to as well, as most of the people who face
malnutrition belong to lower classes. (Kalayanarooj, 2005)

This research can prove useful for biologists and doctors as they can use this to find ways to
minimize the effects of dengue on its patients. They can also use my research to discover other
factors which can affect the severity of dengue. It can also lead to governments working on the
nutritional status of people living in slums and villages with issues such as malnutrition.