County health officials learned of the case from the patient’s health provider. But the person wouldn’t help investigators trying to track the virus’ spread.
(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) An example of a measles virus.
Salt Lake County health officials say it’s probable they have found the county’s first measles case since a national outbreak started earlier this year.
They say “probable” because the person officials believe is infected has declined to be tested or take part in an investigation, the Salt Lake County Health Department said in a statement Wednesday.
Because of that refusal, the department said it can’t officially confirm whether the person has measles — or determine where the person was, or where others might have been exposed to the virus.
Officials only know about the case because the person went to a medical provider, and the provider contacted the health department on Monday, agency spokesperson Nicholas Rupp said.
Rupp said the department notified everyone who might have been exposed in that office. Health officials then spent Tuesday trying to contact the person to confirm they were sick, according to the release.
The infected person has been unwilling to share even their address, Rupp added.
If confirmed, the Salt Lake County case would add to the 59 confirmed measles cases in Utah this year, according to the Utah Department of Health and Human Services, with two of those cases confirmed within the last three weeks.
Dorothy Adams, the Salt Lake County Health Department’s executive director, emphasized that information a patient shares in an illness interview is confidential, collected “only to investigate the source of illness and attempt to prevent further spread.”
The department stressed in its news release that people can ask health investigators to prove they are who they say they are, by asking for an email from their official “.gov” address. People contacted by phone can hang up, call the health department back and ask to be transferred to the investigator.
People who have not been immunized against the virus and are exposed have a 90% chance of becoming infected, the county health department said. However, the agency said, people who receive two doses of the MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine are protected from the virus 97% of the time — and if a vaccinated person does get infected, the symptoms are typically milder than they would be for an unvaccinated person.
One in every five unvaccinated people who are infected end up needing to be hospitalized, the county health department said. The department is asking health care providers to keep measles in mind as a possibility when diagnosing patients.
Typical symptoms for measles, the county health department said, include fever, cough, a runny nose or red, watery eyes within one or two weeks of being infected. Two or three days after those symptoms occur, people will develop small white spots in their mouth. A day or two after that, they will see a rash on their hairline or face that spreads to the rest of their body.
If someone suspects they have the measles, the agency said, they should call their health provider before going to see them — so the provider can make plans to isolate them, so other patients aren’t at risk.
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