TAMPA, Fla. — Doctors across the state are now on high alert after at least six measles cases have been linked to Broward County Elementary School.
“Is this a bad thing? Definitely. It has been tragic in the past,” said Dr. Jill Roberts, Associate Professor at the USF College of Public Health.
Health officials are closely tracking the cases. They believe this outbreak has likely been caused by a decrease in vaccinations.
“As vaccination rates have fallen, it’s definitely become more of a concern and something that I’m actually looking out for,” said Dr. Sharon Rachapudi, a pediatrician for AdventHealth.
“It happens every time something introduces the idea of vaccine hesitancy. And so with COVID, there was so much vaccine hesitancy around the COVID vaccine, so much purposefully spread mis and disinformation,” said Roberts.
“Once people start thinking, 'Oh, maybe I should be worried about these vaccines,' and kind of listen to all this misinformation that’s out there, they may actually not get vaccinated,” she added.
Experts believe the vaccination rate has also declined because, since the COVID-19 pandemic, people have gotten out of the routine of going to the doctor.
“When we had people not getting those regular vaccines on schedules, measles loves to fill in that gap. We see outbreaks in measles with people that fall between the cracks because of their age. So kids that are coming up to college, for example, need another booster, but they’re not going for those annual visits anymore, so they don’t know,” said Roberts.
Health officials said this recent measles outbreak is concerning, especially if the vaccination rates keep declining.
“The ramifications for this are serious. It’s not something to mess around with,” said Roberts.
“We haven’t gotten any better at taking care of measles than we were in the 1960s. There’s no new therapies, there’s no new treatments, there’s no new nothing. What we did do was vaccinate and try to get rid of it. And so I think that hesitancy piece is very scary,” she added.
According to the CDC, the measles disease is highly contagious. It starts with a fever and soon after causes a cough, runny nose and red eyes.
Then white spots can appear in the mouth. As the disease progresses, a rash of tiny, red spots breaks out that first starts on the head and then spreads to the rest of the body.
Measles can lead to serious complications.
“That’s the dangerous part of measles is one in four people who contract measles can actually be hospitalized,” said Rachapudi.
“It actually has a fairly high mortality rate among children, so up to three in 1,000 children can pass away from it,” she added.
Even if someone recovers from measles, it can still affect them down the road.
“What happens with measles infections is it can look very mild at first, but you may not know that it’s actually caused a brain infection that doesn't show up for 10 years and is fatal,” said Roberts.
While this current outbreak isn’t widespread, and at this point, chances for contracting it are low, health officials believe more cases are likely to be reported in the coming weeks. That's why they want families to be aware of the symptoms just in case, especially if they’re unvaccinated.
“I would say if you have any concerns, your child has been exposed, or they’re starting to develop any of these symptoms, getting evaluated by a provider right away is really important,” said Rachapudi.
“There’s a couple of groups who are susceptible to it. Specifically, yes, children under five are very susceptible, immunocompromised people, pregnant people, but even in healthy people over 20, there have been cases, and they can still have complications,” she added.
