Brief Answer:
Shingles.

Detailed Answer:
Without seeing you I can't say for 100 percent certain what it is, but the symptoms you describe sound like it is very likely to be shingles.

Shingles is reactivation of the chicken pox virus. After you recover from chicken pox (usually as a child), the virus (herpes varicella zoster) lives quietly in your nervous system. The antibodies you formed to the virus keep it in check there. Years later it can come back out causing an area of red blisters. This is usually preceded or accompanied by chills, possibly low grade fever, and feeling generally ill. That "ill" part of the course goes away after a few days but the blistering rash grows until your body gets it back in check. Unlike chicken pox which is all over the body, shingles is usually in one "dermatome" - an area that is supplied by one nerve or region of nerves, and is usually only on one side of the body or the other. In addition to the blistering rash, there is usually nerve type pain that sometimes feels like electric shocks.

There is no medicine that will kill the virus but your body will get it back in check...

BUT: Antiviral medication such as Acyclovir, started QUICKLY (best within the first 36 hours of eruption) will decrease the duration and severity of the shingles. It will also greatly reduce the risk of "post-herpetic neuralgia" - pain that continues after the shingles lesions are gone.

I have had shingles and the Acyclovir greatly reduces pain.

Since time for starting an antiviral is of the essence, is there no urgent care or ER you can go to that is open? If you can't find one, can you call your primary doctor or his/her call group to see if they can phone in a prescription for Acyclovir to a 24 hour Walgreens pharmacy?

If none of that works and you can't start the medicine tonight, DO go in to an urgent care clinic tomorrow ASAP.

Please let me know if I can provide further information or clarification. I hope you feel better soon.

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