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Homeland Security and Emergency Management
DATE: April 14, 2011 3:36:15 PM MDT

SLVHD measles update 4/14/11

SLVHD-Measles
Update 4/14/11
Updated Information is in Trebuchet italics.

 Situation Update

  • Salt Lake Valley Health Department staff is working diligently to contain the measles outbreak and to minimize the outbreak’s impact on our community by locating potentially exposed individuals, drawing and testing blood samples, providing vaccinations and/or administering immune globulin, overseeing isolation of confirmed cases and voluntary quarantine of contacts with no evidence of measles immunity.
  • For more information, the public should call their primary care physician or the NEW SLVHD Health Hotline at 801.468.3021

Local Information

Salt Lake County

  • 5 confirmed cases
  • 1 probable case
  • 0 suspect cases

All confirmed cases have passed beyond the infectious period and are therefore no longer under voluntary isolation. Individuals who may have been exposed to these cases during the infectious period and who are not vaccinated against measles are still under voluntary quarantine (and excluded from schools) as the measles incubation period has not ended and those individuals may still potentially develop—and transmit – the disease.

Quarantine vs. Isolation 

Public health uses two main traditional strategies—quarantine and isolation—to contain the spread of illness. These are common health care practices to control the spread of a contagious disease by limiting people's exposure to it. The difference between quarantine and isolation:

·         Isolation applies to persons who are known to be ill with a contagious disease.
·         Quarantine applies to those who have been exposed to a contagious disease but who may or may not become ill. 

Granite Schools Involved

  • Olympus High, Skyline High, Evergreen Junior High, and William Penn Elementary (exposures only)
  • 98% of school-age children in SL County are properly vaccinated for measles

CDC Case Classification (http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/surv-manual/chpt07-measles.htm#6)

Case classification requires a consideration of the clinical presentation.

  • Suspected:  Any febrile illness accompanied by rash.
  • Probable:  A case that meets the clinical case definition, has noncontributory or no serologic or virologic testing, and is not epidemiologically linked to a confirmed case.             
  • Confirmed:  A case that is laboratory confirmed or that meets the clinical case definition and is epidemiologically linked to a confirmed case. A laboratory-confirmed case does not need to meet the clinical case definition.

Statewide information

  • No confirmed cases outside of Salt Lake County at this time.

National Information

  • Of 29 measles cases reported during January--February, 2011, a total of 28 were import-associated, of which 16 (57%) were classified as imported cases; 13 of the imported cases (81%) were among U.S. residents. All seven patients had recently traveled internationally. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6013a1.htm?s_cid=mm6013a1_w
  • On March 2, 2011, the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) confirmed measles in a Hennepin County. Of those cases, 11 were laboratory confirmed, and two were in household   contacts of confirmed cases and met the clinical case definition for measles.

World Information

Additional SLVHD Measles Messages

  • Measles causes fever, runny nose, cough and a rash all over the body.
  • 30% of those who get measles have complications that can include meningitis, pneumonia, seizures, encephalitis (swelling of the brain), blindness and brain damage.
  • Measles is a vaccine-preventable disease. Children should get two doses of the vaccine and adults born after 1957 who may not have been immunized should contact their doctor to see if they need the vaccine.
  • Measles vaccine, which has been commonly used for more than 50 years, can safely and effectively prevent this disease. This case indicates why it’s important for people to be protected against measles. People should have their health care providers review their immunization records and get vaccinated against the measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases as appropriate. Measles vaccine is available through primary care physicians and local health departments.
  • Health officials stress the importance of voluntary quarantine in the effort to contain this outbreak. This means that individuals who may have been exposed to measles and have not been vaccinated should stay home (i.e. no work, church, or recreational activities); specifically those who have been contacted by health officials and includes students who were excluded from school due to lack of vaccination.

Transmission

  • The virus is transmitted by respiratory droplets such as coughing, sneezing and/or direct contact to secretions from an infected person.
  • Measles is so contagious that if one person has it, 90% of the people close to that person—if they are not immune—will also become infected.

Signs & Symptoms

  • Measles symptoms and signs appear 10 to 12 days after exposure to the virus.
  • Measles typically begins with a mild to moderate fever, accompanied by other signs and symptoms, such as a persistent cough, runny nose, inflamed eyes (conjunctivitis) and sore throat. Two    or three days later, Koplik's spots—a characteristic sign of measles—appear.
  • Three to five days after the start of symptoms, a red or reddish-brown rash appears. The rash usually begins on a person’s face at the hairline and spreads downward to the neck, trunk, arms, legs, and feet.
  • When the rash appears, a person’s fever may spike to more than 104 degrees Fahrenheit.

What to Do If You Get Symptoms

  • The infected person is contagious for four days before the rash appears, and continues to be so for four afterwards. Persons are strongly encouraged to stay home during this timeframe.

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