Aikro

Aikro: (n.) rope, vine; (adj.) tied, bound, restricted; (v.) to tie, bind, or otherwise restrict.

Example: "Alo aikro nondaga."
"The rope has them (informal)."; an Iuxat idiom meaning that a subject close to the speaker has the disease known as aikro.

Aikro is a well-known, highly-contaigious febrile disease that primarily spreads through Rostran communities. While most weather the disease with little incident, its high transmissibility, sudden onset, and limited ability to evolve and skirt immune responses make it a much-feared disease in small communities with little prospect of outside assistance. The virus is named for it's ability to lock or 'bind' a sufferer up with uncontrollable shivering, a product of the high fevers it may raise.

Causes

Aikro may be a variant of the human influenza virus evolved to preferrentially infect Rostrans, though there is also some evidence to suggest that it is Rostran histology, not the virus itself, which makes for the difference in reactions between human and Rostran hosts. The virus is spread through the air on exhaled droplets and saliva, though it seldom lingers for long on dry surfaces or in direct sunlight. The incubation period of aikro is between 24 and 72 hours from firt exposure.

Symptoms

Aikro primarily raises high fevers in its victims. While Rostrans have a somewhat better tolerance of high internal body temperatures than their human counterparts - a useful quality in the hot, humid environs of their native Rostral D - they retain their cousins' tendency to respond to fevers with a sensation of 'chills.' These chills, in turn, induce uncontrollable shivering in the subject. One of the defining features of aikro is that this shivering tends to overcome a victim all of a sudden, sometimes even causing them to collapse in public places. The shivers can last in varying degrees of intensity for between three to five days, after which the subject recovers almost as quickly.
Other common symptoms of aikro include muscle aches, a dry cough, flushing, and dizzyness. In rare cases, a sufferer will go on to develop secondary pneumonia or experience siezures and concomitant brain damage as the result of hyperthermia. The case fatality rate of aikro ranges around one percent across all age cohorts, with most deaths occuring among the elderly or those who collapse in hot conditions (i.e. while working in the summer heat).

Treatment

There is no known cure for aikro, though there are vaccines which offer between one to three years of protection from contemporary strains. Care is supportive in nature and involves administering anti-febrile medications (i.e. acetaminophen) and fluids, providing bed rest, and keeping the patient cool. Caregivers must be careful to wear masks and keep themselves clean to reduce the risk of contracting the disease or spreading to others. Clothing, bedding, and utensils used by the patient should also be washed thuroughly to further reduce spread.

Prognosis

The disease typically resolves itself within a week, providing sterilizing immunity for one to three years before the disease mutates among the community again to bypass it.

Epidemiology

Aikro is greatly feared for it's high transmissibility rate, with caregivers and other members of a victim's household often catching the disease themselves.

Type

Viral

Origin

Natural

Cycle

Short-term

Rarity

Uncommon

Affected Species

• Rostran