EpidemicsU.S. scrambling to contain potential measles outbreak
Public health officials in the United States are scrambling to prevent a massive measles outbreak after an infected woman came into contact with thousands of people as she travelled through three U.S. airports; measles is a highly contagious respiratory virus that can be transmitted through coughing or sneezing; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is in the process of tracking down passengers that may have come into contact with the infected woman and closely monitoring airport employees; each year the disease kills approximately 200,000 people around the world, primarily children, but thanks to widespread vaccinations against measles, fatality rates in the United States are low
The highly contagious measles virus // Source: mylocalhealthguide.com
Public health officials in the United States are scrambling to prevent a massive measles outbreak after an infected woman came into contact with thousands of people as she travelled through airports in the United Kingdom, Washington, D.C., Denver, and Albuquerque on Tuesday 22 February 2011.
Dr. William Schaffner, professor and chair of the department of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University, said, “Public health authorities consider this a medical urgency, if not an emergency.”
“They will do everything they can to track down everyone to see if they are indeed protected,” he said. Measles is a highly contagious respiratory virus that can be transmitted through coughing or sneezing and symptoms include fever, coughing, a runny nose, and a rash.
Since the disease is airborne, public health officials worry that fellow passengers on the woman’s flight or even those that passed through the same airports could have been infected.
“Measles is the most communicable virus that we know and it can be transmitted not just person to person, but over considerable distances because it wafts in the air and then people can inhale it when they are some distance away,” Dr. Schaffner said.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is in the process of tracking down passengers that may have come into contact with the infected woman and closely monitoring airport employees.
Tom Skinner, a spokesman for the CDC, said, “Measles is a highly contagious disease and for some people it can be pretty serious. So we need reach out to those that are at risk.”
The infected woman contracted the virus in the United Kingdom before boarding a plane to Washington Dulles International Airport where she then connected to a flight heading to Denver International Airport before landing at her final destination of Albuquerque International Airport.
“It’s a potentially devastating illness,” Dr. Schaffner said. “It still kills many children worldwide, so this is not a disease which we wish to reintroduce into the United States.”
Each year the disease kills approximately 200,000 people around the world, primarily children, but thanks to widespread vaccinations against measles, fatality rates in the United States are low, with only three deaths per 1000 cases. In developing countries the fatality rate from measles can be as high as 28 percent.
According to the National Institutes of Health, cases of measles have been on the rise in North America.
In an unrelated incident, public health officials in Boston are currently monitoring about 180 people after an infected woman travelling from France spread the disease to her co-workers. So far five cases have been confirmed.
In 2008 at least 127 people were infected with measles across fifteen states, in the country’s largest measles outbreak in ten years.
