Journal of Urgent Care Medicine

City Water the Source of a Legionnaires’ Outbreak

A Legionnaires’ disease outbreak in Grand Rapids, Minnesota—a city with a population of 11,000—has been linked to the area’s municipal water system, according to officials. Water samples from 2 buildings in Grand Rapids tested positive for Legionella and matched the bacteria from patient respiratory samples. The public utilities water supply is not chlorinated, and officials say installing a chlorination system to treat the water “is being looked into.” Of the 14 cases associated with the outbreak, all have …

Hep A Outbreaks Are Now Surging in Five States

Ohio has joined Michigan, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Indiana in declaring an outbreak of hepatitis A. Michigan has the most confirmed cases with 843. Ohio has “only” 79, but that’s twice as many as the state saw all last year. Community health departments are requesting thousands of doses of hep A vaccine in the hope of stemming the tide. Given the proximity of the states, the presumption on the part of health officials is that …

California Hep A Outbreak Continues—and Could Last Years

We told you in August about a hepatitis A outbreak that killed eight people in San Diego County, CA. The worse news is that hep A continues to spread throughout California—and could continue to do so for years to come, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions. At least 569 people have been infected, including 17 who have died, since last November in San Diego, Santa Cruz, and Los Angeles counties. They’re among …

Measles Cases Skyrocket; Are Anti-Immigration, Antivaccine Activists to Blame?

Minnesota has seen a huge uptick in measles cases lately, coinciding statistically with a drop in immunization rates in the state. In addition to the antivaccine movement going on all over the country, Minnesota has a subgroup of activists who are also anti-immigration that has tried to convince Somali immigrants that vaccines are dangerous as a way to dissuade more Somalis from moving in. The first measles cases cropped up a month ago, and public …

Can You Help Stem Nationwide Outbreak of Mumps?

Just weeks ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed there had been more than 2,300 cases of mumps confirmed around the country—more than twice the number that occurred in all of 2015. Today there are over 2,000 under investigation in Arkansas alone, with several other states still reporting higher-than-average outbreaks. Urgent care clinicians in college towns should be aware that campuses in affected areas have been especially hard hit. The University of Missouri …

CDC Finds Strong Link Between Zika and Guillain-Barre

An outbreak of Guillain-Barré syndrome in Vancouver, WA—in which four times the number of cases reported in a typical year have been reported—appears to be related to an outbreak of Zika virus in the area, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC notes that Brazil, in which the mosquito that carries Zika is found in great numbers, also saw an increase in cases of Guillain-Barre following a spike in Zika infections. …

Is It Measles or Something Else?

Urgent message: Although measles was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000, outbreaks continue to occur, with unvaccinated travelers most often being the carriers and transmitting the disease to clusters of unvaccinated individual residents. Overview and Current Outbreak According to the World Health Organization, 145,700 people around the world died of measles in 2013, which equates to 400 deaths per day or 16 deaths per hour. Measles remains one of the leading causes of …