New York City officials detected polio in the city’s sewage, confirming at least one carrier of the virus in the city recently.
Surveillance for the virus was initiated after a confirmed case was found near Rockland County last month. Wastewater monitoring in Orange County – also just outside the city’s Bronx borough – also detected at least two samples of polio since June.
Officials have warned that there could be hundreds – potentially – thousands of undiagnosed cases circulating across the state. Because the majority of cases are asymptomatic or very mild, it is likely that the majority will go undetected.
In response, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) deployed a team to Rockland County earlier this week to investigate the outbreak and help vaccinate local communities. Both Rockland and Orange counties have vaccinated just 60% of residents – some of the lowest rates in the state.
The Big Apple has a vaccination rate of 86%, still far below the 95% threshold deemed necessary to avoid a widespread outbreak.
Although the incidence of polio in America’s largest city can be frightening, a vaccinated person is not considered to be in danger. Many Americans have had to be vaccinated to go to school, and do not need a booster shot. More than 90 percent of the US population has been immunized against polio.
“The risk to New Yorkers is real, but prevention is simple – get polio vaccine,” said Dr.
‘With polio circulating in our community, nothing is more essential than vaccinating our children to protect them from this virus, and if you are an unvaccinated adult or incomplete vaccination, please choose now to immunize.
‘polio is completely preventable and its reappearance should be a call to action for all of us.’
Officials did not confirm when the samples were collected. There’s also no way to tell if it’s a visitor to the city or a resident.
The case of polio found in Rockland earlier this year has come as a shock. This is the first case to be detected nationally in more than a decade, and likely the first to arise in the United States since before the turn of the century.
It was found in a man in his 20s who was experiencing a severe case, with his symptoms including paralysis.
The man was hospitalized, although returned home to recuperate. His current situation is unknown.
His polio case was a vaccine-induced strain. This form of polio appears as a result of the oral polio vaccine, which gives the person a live form of the virus.
In some cases, the recipient may become infected. For this reason, it is no longer used in the US, although some developing countries still use it.
Officials have not confirmed whether they know whether the virus found in wastewater samples from the area is a wild strain or caused by a vaccine.
However, just the discovery of one case put officials on high alert.
“Based on previous polio outbreaks, New Yorkers should be aware that for every observed case of polio, there could be thousands of cases of polio,” said Dr. Mary Bassett, state health commissioner. Hundreds of others are infected,” said Dr. Mary Bassett, the state’s health commissioner, earlier this week.
‘Along with the latest wastewater findings, the Department is treating a single case of polio as just the tip of an iceberg with a much greater potential for transmission.’
A local Rockland official said this week that the true case count in the Empire State could be in the thousands.
‘It’s not just a case of paralysis if you see a case of paralysis. The incidence of polio is less than one per cent,’ Dr Patricia Schnabel Ruppert, the Rockland County health commissioner, told the BBC.
‘Most cases are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms and those symptoms are often missed.
‘So there are hundreds, perhaps even thousands of cases that have happened for us to see a case of paralysis.’
Source: | This article originally belonged to Dailymail.co.uk
