Another dozen measles cases were diagnosed in Texas over the weekend, bringing the state's total to 158, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services.
Dr. Jennifer Shuford, the commissioner of the state health department, updated state legislators on the number of known measles cases during a hearing with the public health committee in Austin on Monday morning.
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WATCH HEREThe cases stretch across nine counties including Rockwall County in North Texas. The Rockwall County case is not believed to be a part of a larger outbreak in West Texas. The South Plains near Lubbock is where most of the cases are found but the disease has recently spread to Central Texas.
Public health officials said this could be a lengthy ordeal with the highly contagious virus. More than 20 people in Texas have been hospitalized with the measles and an unvaccinated West Texas child died.
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SIGN UP “Due to the number of suspect cases that we have right now, we do expect more confirmed cases to occur in this outbreak,” Shuford said. “We know other outbreaks that have happened in the last 10 years across the United States have lasted months. Some as short as two and a half months, but the one in New York lasted around 10 and a half months.”
Shuford told the panel that nine out of ten unvaccinated Texans may become infected if they are exposed to the virus. If a county or school district has under a 95% vaccination rate against the disease, they are open to an outbreak. 온라인카지노사이트 5 reported last week that many counties and school districts in North Texas have fallen below that rate in the past few years.
She spoke in front of the Texas House Committee of Public Health, chaired by New Boston Republican Rep. Gary VanDeaver.
“We’re seeing outbreaks of diseases that we thought were relegated to the pages of history, hospitalized and killing some of our youngest Texans,” said Rep. VanDeaver, R- New Boston, opening the committee Monday morning.
Shuford said they are preparing for future outbreak scenarios and have worked to access vaccine resources from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They plan to begin coordinating reporting with hospitals to the CDC when it comes to cases and bed space. The state is working with Tarrant County to open a local testing site. Currently, all the specimens head to the state laboratory in Austin.
Governor Greg Abbott's office tells 온라인카지노사이트 5 he's deployed epidemiologists, immunization teams, and specimen collection teams to the impacted area, managed through the state Medical Operations center.
State employees are operating vaccination clinics seven days a week in the South Plains, according to Shuford.
“We’re helping with hospital planning. We have done a call to hospitals across the state looking at their pediatric bed availability. We’re starting hospital reporting this week,” Shuford said. “We can look at those pediatric resources from across the state, including pediatric ICU beds, to make sure that we are prepared.”
The new Secretary of Health and Human Services in Washington D.C., Robert F. Kennedy Jr, has long been skeptical of some vaccines. However, in an opinion piece on Fox News, he urged Americans in a "call to action" supporting public health measures.
“The decision to vaccinate is a personal one. Vaccines not only protect individual children from measles, but also contribute to community immunity, protecting those who are unable to be vaccinated due to medical reasons," wrote Kennedy.
