Argentina investigates cause of bilateral pneumonia that killed 3 people

Argentine authorities are awaiting the results of new tests to identify the causes of bilateral pneumonia diagnosed in nine people in the city of San Miguel de Tucumán, in the northwest of the country. In recent days, three of the patients have died.

The matter gained repercussion on Thursday (1st), when PAHO (Pan American Health Organization) released a note on the situation.

According to the statement, the onset of symptoms in the first six patients occurred between August 18 and 22. They reported fever, muscle pain, abdominal pain, and shortness of breath, and were diagnosed with bilateral pneumonia.

Between August 20 and 23, three more people began to show similar symptoms and also had bilateral pneumonia confirmed.

Samples were taken from patients and tests for respiratory viruses, bacteria and fungi were performed, but so far all the results have been negative, leaving the cause of the disease open.

According to PAHO, the patients are employees and users of the same health center in San Miguel. Because of this, one of the hypotheses of specialists consulted by the Argentine press is the infection by Legionella pneumophila, a bacterium that has been found in air conditioning systems and that in 2013 killed nurses in the city of Carmen de Areco.

This bacterium, indicates the WHO (World Health Organization), was identified for the first time in 1977, after causing cases of severe pneumonia in a convention center in the United States in 1976, and one of the ways to avoid it is to clean of the building’s air conditioning systems.

In Brazil, Ordinance No. 3,523/98 of the Ministry of Health, which deals with indoor air quality, stipulates, among other measures, that all air conditioning systems in the country “must be in adequate conditions of cleaning, maintenance, operation and control”. .