0 a serious disease that causes fever, swelling of the joints (= places where two bones are connected), and possible heart damage --
Cardiac failure, acute rheumatic fever and thromboembolic disease were the most common causes of death in these young patients.
Of these, 8,100 were attributed to acute rheumatic fever and 61,002 to chronic disease, totalling 69,102 (or 1.08% of all deaths due to cardiovascular disease).
The rates for acute rheumatic fever are very low in relation to the expected figures considering their proportion of poverty.
With such high rates of streptococcal acquisition it is possible that most susceptible people will eventually develop rheumatic fever.
These two categories often reach significant proportions, being several times the registered rates for acute rheumatic fever and chronic rheumatic heart disease.
Susceptibility to rheumatic fever have been ascertained because of the poor quality of records in earlier years.
In addition, mitral plus either aortic or tricuspid lesions are usually secondary to rheumatic fever.
Because of the severe cardiac impairment produced by the disease, all efforts to include prophylaxis for rheumatic fever in public health programs are justified.
