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posted by takyon on Monday May 07 2018, @06:20PM   Printer-friendly

Measles exposure warning issued for four New York counties

A traveler from Europe may have exposed people to measles in Chemung, Genesee, Livingston and Niagara counties, the New York state Department of Health warned Saturday. The traveler, who has a confirmed case of measles, visited multiple sites in upstate New York on April 30, and May 1-2. Anyone who visited the following locations on these dates and times could have been exposed:

  • Old Country Buffet, 821 Country Route 64, Elmira, between 1 and 4 p.m. April 30.
  • Ontario Travel Plaza on the New York state Thruway in Le Roy, between 4 and 6:30 p.m. April 30.
  • Sheraton Niagara Falls, 300 3rd Street, Niagara Falls, from 5:30 p.m. April 30 to 9:30 a.m. on May 2.
  • Niagara Falls Urgent Care, 3117 Military Road. Suite 2, Niagara Falls, between 3 and 6 p.m. May 1.
  • Exit 5 on Interstate 390 in Dansville, from 9:30 a.m. to noon May 2.

The times reflect the period that the infected person was in these areas and a two-hour period after the individual left the area. The virus remains alive in the air and on surfaces for up to two hours.

takyon: Measles outbreaks have been reported in Okinawa, Pennsylvania, and Missouri recently.


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  • (Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Tuesday May 08 2018, @02:40PM (2 children)

    by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us (6553) on Tuesday May 08 2018, @02:40PM (#677034) Journal

    Very interesting set of sources. It will take me time to digest them, thank you. The first source seems to confirm that there is 96% effectiveness for the measles vaccine throughout the follow up period. But I see where titer results wane over time, the question would be at what point is the titration rate ineffective (and that is a variable range, not a set number...) And I follow the concern with passive immunity, however that was one study which suggested that in a very limited field of literature review. The usual "more study is needed" is emphasized with a review as limited as that. I don't believe the answer is "don't vaccinate the mother." But it is food for thought and further study.

    I'll need to review the second set of references closely, as it is an interesting construction; if the math and logic holds then the number would be around 96% required to be vaccinated to cross the 93% effected population. California had around 2.5% personal belief exemptions the last year they were allowed source, admittedly could be better if I had time. [latimes.com]. I realize the country-wide numbers could be significantly different, but that would be pretty darn close to crossing from 94% to 96% vaccinated population for proper herd immunity.

    Some of those secondary sources seem to be talking world population, and others U.S. I'd say it's poverty's handmaiden, lack of education, as much as poverty itself. But I could be wrong.

    The relevance of discussing global eradication was

    the measels vaccination scheme was originally predicted to eradicate it in a few years

    I'm not saying you wouldn't find a source to substantiate what you said, but a focused global effort did not happen whose concentration was eradication. The way smallpox was eradicated and the way polio is heading. However, I take the point that measles is highly contagious and therefore makes containment an even higher challenge.

    But I'll have to see if I have time to delve deeper because it's an interesting take you have.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 08 2018, @09:28PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 08 2018, @09:28PM (#677193)

    the measels vaccination scheme was originally predicted to eradicate it in a few years

    I'm not saying you wouldn't find a source to substantiate what you said

    I was wrong, they predicted eradication in one year:

    The Center for Disease Control (CDC) led in mounting the program with a formal paper at the American Public Health Association annual meeting in Miami in the fall of 1966. Two colleagues and I wrote the “official statement” which outlined in detail unqualified statements about the epidemiology of measles and made an unqualified prediction. My third position in the authorship of this paper did not adequately reflect my contribution to the work.14 I will make but two quotes:

    1. “The infection spreads by direct contact from person to person, and by the airborne route among susceptibles congregated in enclosed spaces.” (Obviously the ideas of Perkins and Wells had penetrated my consciousness but not sufficiently to influence my judgment). 2. “Effective use of (measles) vaccines during the coming winter and spring should insure the eradication of measles from the United States in 1967.” Such was my faith in the broad acceptance of the vaccine by the public and the health professions and in the infallibility of herd immunity.

    [...]

    There are many reasons and explanations for this rather egregious blunder in prediction. The simple truth is that the prediction was based on confidence in the Reed-Frost epidemic theory, in the applicability of herd immunity on a general basis, and that measles cases were uniformly infectious. I am sure I extended the teachings of my preceptors beyond the limits that they had intended during my student days.

    In the relentless light of the well-focussed retrospectiscope, the real failure was our neglect of conducting continuous and sufficiently sophisticated epidemiological field studies of measles. We accepted the doctrines imbued into us as students wikout maintaining the eternal skepticism of the true scientist.

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6939399 [nih.gov]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 08 2018, @10:50PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 08 2018, @10:50PM (#677216)

    the question would be at what point is the titration rate ineffective (and that is a variable range, not a set number...)

    From their Fig 1A it looked like the "seropositivity threshold" they use would be crossed 5-10 years later, which would be ~20 years after being vaccinated at 4-6 years old, or 25-30 years old.
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29317117 [nih.gov]

    And I follow the concern with passive immunity, however that was one study which suggested that in a very limited field of literature review. The usual "more study is needed" is emphasized with a review as limited as that.

    I would agree that understanding is limited (as is all medical understanding at this point), but this has been something known since the beginning. They have been changing the vaccination age based on this since the 1960s:
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3549395 [nih.gov]

    if the math and logic holds then the number would be around 96%

    It doesn't really since the math (SIR models) typically assume a "well-mixed population", ie every person is equi-likely to come in contact with every other person. However, that is whats used to determine policy... The models do seem capable of capturing elements of in the patterns of infectious disease incidence such as its cyclic nature though. Also you could probably find big issues with the vaccination rate data since it is based on a survey, but once again that is what they use.

    the way polio is heading

    Polio eradication seems to have its own issues. Diseases with the exact same symptoms are on the rise as polio diagnoses drop:

    The incidence of NPAFP was strongly associated with the number of OPV doses delivered to the area. A dose–response relationship with cumulative doses over the years was also observed, which strengthens the hypothetical relationship between polio vaccine and NPAFP. The fall in the NPAFP rate in Bihar and UP for the first time in 2012, with a decrease in the number of OPV doses delivered, is evidence of a causative association between OPV doses and the NPAFP rate.

    Trends in Nonpolio Acute Flaccid Paralysis Incidence in India 2000 to 2013. Neetu Vashisht, Jacob Puliyel, Vishnubhatla Sreenivas. Pediatrics Feb 2015, 135 (Supplement 1) S16-S17; DOI: 10.1542/peds.2014-3330DD. http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/135/Supplement_1/S16.2 [aappublications.org]