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Saturday, August 31, 2002Dr. Julie L. Gerberding, the director of the disease centers, said, "We have to take this case seriously and have an open mind about the possibility because transmission of the West Nile virus through blood and organs is biologically plausible." The C.D.C. is responsible for protecting the public's health from infections like West Nile fever. "Although it is too early in the investigation to determine how the man acquired his infection, a leading hypothesis that we are investigating at this time is that it is related to the organ transplant," Dr. Gerberding said in an interview. "Another, but less likely, possibility is that the man acquired the infection through a blood transfusion." To date, there have been 555 cases of West Nile and 28 deaths this year. In contrast, influenza kills anywhere from 20,000 to 40,000 people a year (depending on the virulence of the strain) and hospitalizes 16,000 to 220,000. Millions more come down with the disease each year, but like most cases of West Nile are merely inconvenienced by it. UPDATE: Three other organ recipients from the same donor may have West Nile. It's still not clear whether they got it from the donated tissue or whether they were just unfortunate enough to get infected from mosquitoes. (Organ recipients have to take drugs to suppress the immune system which makes them especially vulnerable to infection.) posted by Sydney on 8/31/2002 08:38:00 AM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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