File photo of a child with hand, foot and mouth disease. Photo / 123RF
A mysterious "tomato flu" has been detected in India and now there are fears it may spread more widely.
The rare viral infection was first detected in Kerala, India on May 6 and has so far infected more than 80 children under the age of five.
Ashley Quigley, who leads artificial intelligence-driven system EPIWATCH at the Kirby Institute in Australia, told NCA NewsWire on Monday there was a risk tomato flu could arrive there.
"I think it's realistic to think that it could get here," she said.
"If we start seeing reports in other neighbouring countries, and we can track it back and say in two months it's in three to five different countries, then the likelihood is actually very high of it coming to Australia.
"But in the last two or three months, it has remained in India."
Although much is still unknown about tomato flu, Quigley said if it turned out to be a variant of hand, foot and mouth disease, then the likelihood of it spreading to Australia from international travel was "really quite high".
"Hand, foot and mouth, especially in children considering their hygiene … with such a highly infectious and highly transmissible virus, the chances of that coming to Australian shores is definitely possible," she said.
Infectious diseases expert Sanjaya Senanayake, from the Australian National University, noted researchers had so far not been able to pin down what kind of virus it was.
"They did testing for other common viruses ... and while it was negative for those, they were calling it tomato flu," he told NCA NewsWire.
"I think these days with PCRs I'm just surprised ... that we haven't had any sequencing done to say what it is ... that's just very odd."
Senanayake agreed that depending on what the tomato flu was, it could arrive in Australia at some point.
"They say it's highly contagious, but again, they haven't given great data to show that — to say it's passed within households or passed at schools," he said.
"In a few months in India, it really hasn't even spread throughout India. It's been very limited to these southern states.
"So at this stage, it hasn't shown any great proclivity for spreading."
Tomato flu could be an after-effect of chikungunya or dengue fever in children.
The virus could also be a new variant of hand, foot and mouth disease, which mostly targets children aged one to five and immunocompromised adults.
Symptoms include a rash, fever, and joint aches and pain.
"At the moment, its origin is unknown; they're not really quite sure how it started," Quigley said.
But she added it was most likely to be a new variant of hand, foot and mouth disease.
"Specifically, considering it's targeting children aged one to five and immunocompromised adults, which obviously presents a problem in light of Covid," she said.
"But there is also a chance that it's just an after-effect of chikungunya or dengue."
Quigley said it was transmissible through contact, but fortunately the rashes included painful blisters, so it could be detected quickly.
"It's quite obvious when somebody has it, unlike Covid, where you may be carrying it and be asymptomatic," she said.
"In that sense, you can manage it quite quickly when you become aware of the blisters."
Isolation is the main way to treat someone infected with tomato flu.
Quigley said people should drink plenty of fluids, too.
"There's no known treatment for it at the moment, and so it's just really about keeping the body hydrated and well rested at this time," she said.
Practising good hygiene, especially in younger children, is the key recommendation as health experts learn more about tomato flu.
"If you're immunocompromised, in light of Covid, you should be practising really strong hand hygiene and hygiene in general already," Quigley said.
"If there is an outbreak at a daycare or a nursery here, it's really about hygiene and sterilising all of the infected toys and things that have been played with in the day," she said.
"People that have been exposed must isolate for five to seven days, until such time that it's either ruled out or they are no longer infectious.
"It's really hard with children to stop them from touching each other, sharing toys and putting things in their mouth.
"That's just the nature of how they play, and so if this does turn out to be a variant, then it will rapidly spread among schools and daycares."