Health
Disneyland Measles Outbreak Strikes in Anti-Vaccination Hotbed of California
Fred Barbash, THE WASHINGTON POST
ANAHEIM, California (The Washington Post)—Sometime in early December, somebody who probably caught measles abroad visited one of the Disney theme parks in California and perhaps sneezed. That’s all it took. That and the fact there are a lot of people walking around California who have chosen not to be immunized against measles.
“Measles is so contagious,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement, “that if one person has it, 90% of the people close to that person who are not immune will also become infected.”
Now the measles that started at Disney has put California’s Orange County, a hotbed of the anti-immunization movement, at the center of the worst measles outbreak in the state in 15 years, with 62 confirmed cases statewide since December, according to the Los Angeles Times. Additional cases that originated in California have spread to four other states and Mexico. The total infected is up to 70, including five Disney employees who have since returned to work. About a quarter of those who got sick had to be hospitalized.
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