Calcutta, Sept. 22: Doctors have warned against a “hand, foot and mouth disease” that they say is infecting city children.

“The disease is spreading like an epidemic in parts of the city. Usually, we find a few stray cases every year but this year, the number is huge,” said Apruba Ghosh, director of the Institute of Child Health, Calcutta.

Nearly 300 cases have been reported across the city in the past four days. Children younger than five have been found to be vulnerable to the coxsackie virus causing the disease.

“It is highly infectious and causes fever, ulcers in the mouth and vesicles — small swellings filled with liquid under the skin — in the limb joints,” Ghosh said.

Four-year-old Sannaddha Roy had similar symptoms four days ago. He had high fever which subsided by evening, but he was unable to eat as there were ulcers in his mouth.

“In the morning, we found vesicles in the joints of his hands and legs,” said father Sekhar Roy, a resident of Bagha Jatin in south Calcutta. A doctor diagnosed Sannaddha with the hand, foot and mouth disease.

The B.C. Roy Memorial Hospital for Children has received several patients with the disease in the past three or four days at its outpatient department.

Experts say the coxsackie virus is part of the enterovirus family, which includes hepatitis A that is found in the digestive tract.

Usually, the coxsackie virus causes mild flu-like symptoms but sometimes the patients show high fever. The fever usually subsides in three to four days.

Doctors said only symptomatic treatment should be done. There is no vaccine to prevent the infection, they said.

“Parents are advised not to send children suffering from this disease to school because the virus, being air-borne, spreads easily,” Ghosh said.