Dengue is a worldwide problem as well as a local one in Taiwan.
In the last 40 years, dengue has undergone some remarkable and even alarming changes. In many parts of the world, it has reemerged from a controlled to the status of an active disease. Dengue hemorrhage fever and shock has metamorphosed from a local problem of native infants in Southeast Asia into a world wide problem of severe dengue of all ages. One reason for the resurgence of dengue is worldwide break down in the control of Aedes aegypti . The dengue shock syndrome requires the virus as its etiologic agent but otherwise its pathogenesis, as distinct from simple dengue, is controversial.