COLUMBUS, Ohio – First mumps, now measles. Both diseases – prevented with the same vaccine – have broken out in central Ohio, infecting nearly 300 people.
State and local officials on Friday confirmed 16 cases of measles in the Knox County area. At least three of the patients recently traveled to the Philippines, where a measles epidemic has caused 20,000 illnesses.
Health officials in Knox and Holmes counties are opening vaccination clinics Friday and Monday to administer the measles-mumps-rubella, or MMR, vaccine.
The nation has seen more cases of the highly contagious disease so far this year than at the same point of any year since 1996, health officials report.
Authorities say 129 cases in 13 states were reported by mid-April. Most were in California and New York City. Most were triggered by travelers who caught the virus abroad and spread it in the United States among unvaccinated people.
As of Friday afternoon, the mumps outbreak that began at OSU in January had sickened 278 people, most of them in Franklin and Delaware counties, 165 linked to the university.