Called Guanarito this virus is transmitted from animals to humans and causing a terrible disease known as hemorrhagic fever Venezuelan or international acronym VHF, this was first identified in the year 1989 in Portuguesa state, in the municipality Guanarito, from Venezuelan territory, killing around 100 people by then. This condition is based on a feverish picture together with general malaise, strong hemorrhagic manifestations, vomiting, cough, diarrhea, seizures and abdominal pain, resulting fatal in almost 30% of cases.
The transmission of this deadly virus called Guanarito occurs through direct contact or inhalation of the feces of rats, among them the most common are the corn or cotton rat (Sigmodon hispidus) and the cane rat (Zygodontomys brevicauda); It is important to mention that human-to-human transmission has not yet been made known and studies are still being carried out.
It was recorded that between 1990 and 1991 approximately 104 cases were reported with a total of 26 deaths, then the virus reappeared, throwing at least 30 cases between 2001 and 2002 of which only 28% of them fit the profile of the Guanarito virus. In these cases, the most affected people were mostly farmers and people related to working with the land. Various sources state that it kills in seven days, its reproduction cycle is based on the inflammation of the body tissues causing internal bleeding that emanates to the outside through the orifices of the human body.
In this year 2014, at the beginning of March, the Ministry of Health declared that there were at least 9 cases with great suspicions that it was this Venezuelan hemorrhagic fever, of which about 40% of people die.
Due to its high probability of death, the concern arose shortly after the first cases that emerged in 1989 and for fear of a biological warfare; Therefore, several samples of the virus were taken to a Branch of the National Laboratory of the University of Texas, Medical Galveston, where later, specifically on March 24, 2013 , an "inexplicable disappearance" of the virus occurred.
