Mumps epidemic close to over

EPHRATA — It’s been 25 days since a case of mumps has been reported in Grant County — too soon to say the epidemic has abated, but significant progress, according the Grant County Health Officer Alexander Brzezny.

“Twenty-five days, no additional cases. In this outbreak, we can say with great probability that local transmission of the disease has been interrupted,” Brzezny said during a meeting of the Grand County Board of Health on Wednesday.

Symptoms of mumps typically take 25 days to manifest themselves after someone has been exposed, Brzezny said. However, public health protocols do not consider an epidemic to have run its course until after two incubation periods — in this case, 50 days.

“We need another 25 days without a new case,” Brzezny said. “If there are no new cases by the end of June, the outbreak should be over.”

The mumps outbreak in Grant County was centered on the Columbia Basin Job Corps site. Brzezny thanked Job Corps officials for all the work they’d done preventing people from sharing drinking bottles and cigarettes and covering water fountains.

“How you stop people from kissing?” he said of another major way mumps is spread. “I don’t know, and that’s not what the government wants to do.”

Washington state has been hit with over 860 cases of mumps since October, 2016. Spokane County has been hardest hit, with 333 cases, and Grant County is fifth with 45 cases, Grant County has the second highest rate of mumps in the state per 100,000 people after Spokane County.

Brzezny also said that three cases of pertussis — whooping cough — have been reported from different schools in Ephrata.

“Three cases from nowhere, this will keep us busy for some time,” Brzezy said. “This is a high risk for pregnant women, babies, and toddlers.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control, whooping cough “usually starts with cold-like symptoms and maybe a mild cough or fever” for a week or two until the disease progresses into violent coughing fits. Half of all babies under one who become infected require hospital treatment, the CDC says.

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached via email at countygvt@columbiabasinherald.com.