An outbreak in the Los Angeles area of Southern California has now spread to Santa Barbara County and health officials say most were unvaccinated. The Santa Barbara County Public Health Department is investigating exposures to a confirmed measles patient. The one confirmed case in Santa Barbara County is linked to the measles outbreak in Los Angeles that currently involves 11 patients. Of the 12 measles cases now involved in the Los Angeles outbreak, only one has provided documentation of vaccination.
The exposures in Santa Barbara occurred at Goleta Valley Cottage Hospital on Tuesday, December 27th between 7:24 p.m. and 10:16 p.m. There were no other exposures. All exposed healthcare workers, patients, and visitors have already been contacted and appropriate measures are being taken to protect their health and the community. Cottage Health was able to quickly verify that all exposed healthcare workers were fully vaccinated against the measles virus.
“Measles is a highly contagious viral disease that spreads from person to person through coughing or sneezing,” said Jeffrey Gunzenhauser, MD, MPH, Interim Health Officer for Los Angeles County. “To protect individual health and to prevent the spread of measles to others, we urge residents who are not immunized to get the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine as soon as possible. Two doses of MMR vaccine is highly effective in preventing measles and is the best way to protect against disease.”
Measles can spread quickly to those who are not immune. Common signs and symptoms include fever, runny nose, cough, and a rash all over the body. In some persons, measles can cause serious illness such as pneumonia, encephalitis, or even death. The incubation period for developing measles is up to 21 days after exposure to someone else who has the disease.
Measles is a serious disease and can cause encephalitis, pneumonia, and even death. The outcomes are particularly serious for young children, pregnant women, and those with weakened immune systems. In the decade before 1963 when a vaccine became available, it is estimated three to four million people in the United States were infected annually. Each year an estimated 400 to 500 people died, 48,000 were hospitalized, and 4,000 suffered encephalitis (swelling of the brain) from measles.
Individuals who are unsure of their vaccination status should check with their doctor to determine if they need to receive the vaccine. If you are ill, you should first contact your doctor by phone before going to their office so measures can be taken to prevent possible spread to others.
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The majority of non-vaccinated is consistent with other outbreaks. It’s a shame. We have a safe, effective vaccine against measles. People are suffering needlessly from a dangerous, preventable disease because of misinformation.
Dorit….how do you know the other 11 who have Measles don’t have documentation showing they are vaccinated? This writer hasn’t really done the job of reporting the story correctly…just quickly. sloppy!
measles is not a dangerous childhood infection
Amy idiots like you are the reason we have measles outbreaks still.
“Measles is a serious disease and can cause encephalitis, pneumonia, and even death. The outcomes are particularly serious for young children, pregnant women, and those with weakened immune systems. In the decade before 1963 when a vaccine became available, it is estimated three to four million people in the United States were infected annually. Each year an estimated 400 to 500 people died, 48,000 were hospitalized, and 4,000 suffered encephalitis (swelling of the brain) from measles.”
Yes it is. Look up SSPE, it can occur years after an infection and is more common in those who are infected at a very young age. The vaccine is given at age one, which means that those below the age of one are most vulnerable. Do some research.
You are a dangerous infection.
Parents of children willing not vaccinated and contracting preventable diseases , should be cited for child abuse under the law. Also if their children spread these dangerous life threatening diseases to others they should be held criminally and civily responsible .
lucky little cherubs now have lifelong immunnity! so happy for them
As a leukemia and bone marrow transplant survivor who cannot be immunized against measles, contracting “this childhood disease” means for me, quite simply and very certainly, death. People who have no concern for other people are pathetic..
According to the article, in the decade before the vaccine there were approx. 400 deaths per year out of approx. 4 million cases. That equals 1 death per 10,000 cases, over 50 years ago when less effective treatments were available. The MMR vaccine (like all medical procedures) carries risk, which this article artfully neglects to mention.
Robert Herriman, it’s most unfortunate that you didn’t include critical vaccine information for your readers, in the interest of informed consent. The MMR vaccine’s listed on the Vaccine Injury Table maintained by HHS as a cause of brain inflammation, brain damage, chronic arthritis and a severe blood platelet autoimmune disorder, and all the complications that may follow, including death. The vaccine is characterized in another comment as safe, but that’s not what the average parent think of as safe – indeed, it can brain damage and kill your child, totally unpredictably.
The fact that some of the kids in the measles outbreak are vaccinated, regardless of percentage – and to be clear, there have been measles outbreaks specifically where all the kids – 100% – were vaccinated – is what’s critical; it empties the promise of prevention. Measles, meanwhile, is a benign illness in the U.S. – in any nation where nutrition and housing are generally adequate – and has been since the dramatic improvements in public sanitation and municipal water supply during the first half of the 20th century, along with the advent of the home refrigerator – all well before the introduction of the vaccines.
So we see the vaccine consent for what it truly is: a willingness to risk brain damaging your child, in exchange for the empty promise of prevention of an illness from which the vast majority of kids recover with little or no problem, inheriting typically a lifetime of robust, natural immunity in the process.
Vaccination’s a non-choice.
How do you conclude that “most” were unvaccinated when, in the very next sentence say “Of the 12 measles cases now involved in the Los Angeles outbreak, only one has provided documentation of vaccination.”? Providing documentation ISN’T the same thing as saying the other 11 were unvaccinated. SLOPPY journalism is slanted journalism! shame!
A physician who suggests an evidence based approach before administering immune altering therapeutics to healthy children should not be viewed as “anti-vaccine”.
There is zero data that adding yet another MMR dose would be either safe or effective.
There is zero CDC data that the current recommended vaccine schedule of 70+ vaccines does not yield higher rates of autoimmunity, asthma, cancer, SIDS, or neurodevelopmental disorder.
And the international data and privately funded studies that have compared these outcomes find markedly higher rates of chronic illness in the vaccinated arms.
Asthma kills about 4,000 people per year in the U.S.
SIDS about 4,000.
Autoimmune diseases are one of the top 10 killers of girls and women of all ages.
Lifetime risk of cancer in now 1 out of every 2 people.
If the current aggressive vaccine schedule results in even a tiny increase in these risks, then we are talking about thousands or even millions of lives.
Censoring the open evaluation of vaccine risk robs us of the opportunity to recognize signals of harm, and react to them responsibly.
Meredith McBride M.D.
To the pro-diseasers: you are the reason people have children suffering. Yes- YOU.
By promoting fear culture to people ignorant of the importance of vaccination, you directly affect the safety of the population.
It’s embarrassing how uneducated you are (no, believing fear mongering, unsubstantiated twaddle on the internet is not an education!)
And before someone says it, I am a 40 year old full time executive who had an education in formal science and critical thinking – so I do check the QUALITY of my sources which is why I support the importance of the MMR vaccine.
And you never had a child who had a bad reaction to a vaccine. If the MMR is so great, why do the vaccinated come down with the measles? There will always be a source of measles for the traveling public.
I’d appreciate you posting your quality source so I can read it.
I would appreciate you sending along your quality source so I can read it.
My baby was exposed during this outbreak- the MMR vaccine isn’t done until 18 months. It was at Kaiser in Woodland Hills- I believe I sat across from the measles family, who the nurse told me was non-vaccinating. The patient was a middle school boy who looked like death. The nurses told me that the mom let her other children run around the waiting room even though nurses said not to.
What really angers me is that the mom smiled at me and complimented my cute baby who was wearing a Santa Suit, while letting all her children shed their virus all over my little guy.
Kaiser was on top of it and called me to get my baby a special shot.
Did it start in Woodland Hills? You have to wonder why they let the boy just sit in a waiting room with other patients. Did they not know he had it? Did the rest of his family get it? I am so happy you were able to get your baby that special shot, how scary.
The nurse told you something about another person’s health record? That is a HIPAA violation and could send that nurse to jail and fine her and she would lose her job. Thanks for this post. I have sent it on to the people I know at Kaiser. Happy New Year.
http://www.vaccines.me/articles/gjuqe-measles-outbreak-among-100-vaccinated-high-school-students—illinois-1993.cfm
“Editorial Note: This outbreak demonstrates that transmission of measles can occur within a school population with a documented immunization level of 100%.”
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http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/04/measles-outbreak-traced-fully-vaccinated-patient-first-time
“Measles Outbreak Traced to Fully Vaccinated Patient for First Time”
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Vaccine ingredients are not harmless at all (for instance, aluminum and mercury are neurotoxins, formaldehyde is a known carcinogen, etc) and can never lead to herd immunity. Mothers who never got an infectious ‘disease’ (like the measles) don’t fully protect their babies by breast feeding and that’s why we see more and more babies getting these infectious diseases at an age they’re not ready to deal with it yet. How can a vaccine (injection), that bypasses the respiratory/gastrointestinal tract, which makes up for more than 70% of the total immune system, effectively ‘train’ the immune system???
Measles is a mild childhood disease, at least for children who have no vitamin A, D and C depletion (example: 70-90 mg of vitamin C doesn’t even come close to gain from its anti-viral properties). Dr Klenner cured lots of polio cases with high doses of vitamin c – curiously, his studies are still on PubMed, at least the ‘titles’, nothing else, not even the abstracts…
Before the introduction of the measles vaccine the death rate for this disease already decreased by itself to around 400/4 million cases, which provided real (natural) herd immunity and strong, healthy immune systems/children/adults (not the allergic, auto immune diseased youth like we have now).
Anyway, people should be allowed to make up their own minds (informed consent) and this should work both ways, as well for pro vaccine as for anti vaccine preferred parents… Vaccinated people do shed viruses/bacteria as well as unvaccinated ones (it’s even pretty common to see people attending to their work even when they’ve already showing symptoms of the flu, just out of fear of losing their jobs…). And of course, there’s a lot of vaccinated and unvaccinated folks carrying viruses/bacteria days before the first symptoms of the disease show up…
Bottom line: good nutrition (lots of vitamins A, C and D) and naturally fighting off infectious diseases to me looks the most common sense approach to acquire good health. Maybe a bit hard to see if you still believe the religious mantra of conventional medicine (driven and controlled by big pharma) that ‘vaccines are safe and effective’ 🙂