Outbreak of Measles Following an Imported Case Florida As of December 13, 1982, 203 confirmed cases of measles, with rash onsets from September 10 through December 3, were reported from Dade County, Florida. Three additional cases in Florida were linked to the outbreak. The source of the outbreak was an imported case* in a 14-year-old male resident of Dade County, who lacked documentation of immunity to measles.** He had vacationed in Peru from July 31 to August 31. From August 24 to 26, he had face-to-face contact with a cousin in Peru who had fever and a generalized maculopapular rash. After returning to the United States, he attended Junior High School A from September 1 until rash onset on September 10. He transmitted measles to seven students at Junior High School A, all of whom lacked documentation of measles immunity. They had rash onsets from September 20 through September 27. This led to a county-wide outbreak concentrated primarily in school children (Figure 1). As part of the response to the outbreak, local authorities ordered a review of immunization records of all students in public and private schools in Dade County; 286,000 immunization records were reviewed to identify all students who had inadequate evidence of immunity to measles. Initially, susceptible students were excluded from those schools in which there were measles cases. On October 28, a county-wide measles emergency was declared by the County Health Director permitting non-compliant students, including those with medical or religious exemptions to vaccination, to be excluded from school attendance beginning on November 8 in south Dade County, and on November 22 in north Dade County. Specially assigned State Immunization Program staff joined county health personnel to review records and to administer vaccines. No measles cases were reported among non-compliant students more than 9 days after the school exclusion day. | |
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