Chikungunya virus

One bite and you're infected. After a few days of incubating in your bloodstream, the bouts of fever and crippling joint pain set in. The chikungunya virus can make you practically bedridden for months on end - and in the worst cases, the pain can last for years. There is currently neither a vaccine nor effective treatment and patients are left to wait for their bodies to fight off the virus. While its symptoms are similar to dengue fever, the virus is not fatal, and once those who suffer from it finally beat the virus off they are immune to reinfection for life.

Since 1953, the Asian tiger mosquito and the yellow fever mosquito have spread the chikungunya virus. For decades, the infection was contained to East Africa and Asia, but sporadic outbreaks around the Indian Ocean and in Europe were observed as early as 2004. In 2007, the virus infected 200 people in Italy. Then all was quiet again - until now.

First time in America

Taking a route through the French outposts of Martinique and Guadeloupe then French Guyana in South America, the virus has spread throughout the Caribbean and into the Americas. In December 2013 the first case of a local infection was registered in the Americas. In the space of a few months, 180,000 people were infected.

"We expect that it will be the largest chikungunya virus outbreak in history," said Jonas Schmidt-Chanasit from the Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine. "The joint pain can keep people off work for months, sometimes years, and this causes major economic damage."

There are currently 165,000 suspected cases in the Dominican Republic. "If the virus makes its way to Brazil and Mexico, we should expect a massive outbreak," Schmidt-Chanasit said.

Last week, the first two cases were confirmed on the US mainland. In Florida, a 41-year-old woman and a 50-year-old man fell victim to the virus.

Watch out, tourists!

As Europeans continue to return from summer holidays in the Caribbean, some are arriving home with more than just a little sunburn. For several weeks now, the number of reported cases of infection in Germany has been mounting.

As mosquitoes are most active in the warmer months, the transmission of the chikungunya virus as well as dengue fever are expected to accelerate throughout the rest of the northern hemisphere's summer. The Asian Tiger mosquito is most populous in the Mediterranean but there are also concentrations of them in southern Germany. With a carrier population of mosquitoes at the ready and high tourist and business travel between Europe and the United States, "it's only a matter of time before we start seeing locally borne infections in Europe," Schmidt-Chanasit said.