Shillong, Nov. 29: The seasonal scrub typhus disease has claimed 12 lives since August this year at a private hospital here, prompting the hospital authorities to conduct separate studies on the matter.

Since 2009, the Khasi Jaintia Presbyterian (KJP) Hospital, Jaiaw, Shillong detected as many as 500 cases of which this year alone 250 cases are being treated by doctors at the hospital.

According to the medical superintendent of KJP Hospital, Jaiaw, Shillong, David Tariang, the disease is caused mainly because of bites of mites or ticks especially affecting people living in the rural belts of the state.

Tariang, who did research on the disease, said since 2009 many who were affected were brought to KJP.

A state heath department official said the department does not know the exact number of patients admitted to various hospitals. So far no research on the disease was carried out by the state health department. On the website of the health department it was mentioned that there was only a single case reported in 2006.

The KJP is planning to conduct two studies, one with Christian Medical College (CMC) Vellore and a hospital in Himachal Pradesh and another with CMC and eight other hospitals.

While the first study will focus on the ways and means to prepare a vaccine for the disease, the second study will be mainly to carry out research to find out more on the nature of disease compared to other un-differentiated fever.

At present no licensed vaccine is available to cure the disease.

The villagers who venture out to the forests to collect firewood or for any other agricultural activities are affected by the disease once the mites or ticks bite them.

The right diagnosis can save many lives as soon after the bite the patients develop fever, but the main factor which leads to the death is delay in treatment.

The portions where the mites or ticks bite initially become reddish and then transform into black spots.

Besides KJP, several scrub typhus patients are also undergoing treatment at Nazareth Hospital here.

When contacted, the deputy chief minister in-charge, health, Rowell Lyngdoh, said it is yet to be ascertained if the disease has reached an epidemic level.

“We have not received any reports which states that the disease has reached an epidemic level and we can think about creating awareness only if it is alarming,” he added.

So far he had not received any report regarding the matter from the health department.

In Meghalaya, the disease was detected by Tariang in 2004 after proper research.

Prior to 2004, the disease was treated as malaria because of ignorance.

Tariang had carried out extensive study and collected samples after returning from Vellore in Tamil Nadu where he had served for many years.

The findings of the study were that the disease had nothing to do with malaria, but it was in fact scrub typhus.

The disease is known as ricketial infection in southern India and Jammu and Kashmir.