THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A Gulf Keralite’s impulsive decision to return home to treat a persistent fever turned out to be life-saving after he was diagnosed with scrub typhus — a potentially fatal infection that requires early treatment.

This has become the first documented case of scrub typhus contracted in the Gulf and diagnosed in India, according to a case study published in the peer-reviewed journal Mass Gathering Medicine. The report warns that scrub typhus, once thought to be confined to parts of Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific, may now be emerging in the Middle East and recommends testing for the disease in patients with unexplained fever, even in non-endemic areas.

The disease was detected in a 52-year-old Thiruvananthapuram man, who had been living in Dubai.

After four days of high fever, chills, vomiting, and severe fatigue that did not respond to broad-spectrum antibiotics, he flew to Kerala and went straight from the airport to a super-specialty hospital in Thiruvananthapuram. “Some types of fever can only be cured back home,” he told doctors, echoing a common belief among his expatriate friends.

The disease is seen rarely in the Gulf, making diagnosis there unlikely.

However, scrub typhus is familiar to hospitals in Kerala, with nearly 1,000 cases reported annually. The patient was diagnosed within three days and responded quickly to the antibiotic, doxycycline, making a full recovery.