US measles outbreak now the largest since 2000
Tuesday evening, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed there have been 695 cases of measles nationwide since the start of the year. That’s up from the 626 cases the agency reported last week in its weekly update.
Just four months into the year, the number of cases has already surpassed the record of 667 cases in 2014. It is the highest number of cases since the illness was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000.
Read: US inches closer to measles record
“Twenty years ago we did say it was eradicated and because of the lack of vaccination in a small group of people, we are now seeing it again,” Dr. Sujatha Reddy, a medical expert with “Premier Care for Women.”
Riverside County has no reported cases of measles so far this year, but Los Angeles County has and when new numbers are released by the California Department of Public Health on Wednesday, we’ll know how close the state is to an outbreak in 2014 linked to Disneyland where more than 130 people got measles.
Read: CDC report from 2014 – Measles Linked to Disneyland
“Measles is extremely contagious. In a room full of people those who aren’t vaccinated are extremely at high risk for measles,” Reddy said.
Symptoms include a rash of red spots, high fever, cough, runny nose, and red or watery eyes.
“These symptoms can turn into serious complications. People die of the measles because they can develop pneumonia, you can get a brain infection,” Reddy said.
Other complications, which are more likely in patients younger than 5 and older than 20, can include ear infections with permanent hearing loss, diarrhea, and swelling of the brain. Pregnant women who get measles are at risk of premature delivery and having a low-birth-weight baby.
One or two out of every 1,000 people who get measles will die from the disease, according to the CDC, although there has not been a death from the illness in the United States since 2015.
Most of the cases have emerged in communities with low rates of vaccination, fueled by anti-vaccine messages, many times posted on social media.
“Prior to vaccination, millions of people got the measles and several hundred died so there’s no question, this is a real disease with real consequences,” Reddy said.
A person can spread the illness four days before and four days after developing the rash and therefore may unknowingly spread it. The virus can be airborne and spreads when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
“Measles is so contagious that if one person has it, up to 90% of the people close to that person who are not immune will also become infected,” according to the CDC.
Read: More than 20 million children miss measles vaccine each year
Experts recommend that children receive the vaccine in two doses: first between 12 months and 15 months of age and a second between 4 and 6 years old.
