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If it was not for
Thomas Geyer of Quad-City Times and an unnamed reporter at KWQC, the
customers of a Milan, Illinois McDonalds might never know where they got
Hepatitis A
Source of
Article: http://www.marlerblog.com/
Thank goodness for what is
left of a free press. If not for the Quad-City Times and KWQC, the folks of
Rock Island County would not know the following:
From KWQC - Hepatitis A Outbreak
Latest
- Rock Island County now has 14
with Hepatitis A. That brings the total number to 20 cases, with 11
people being hospitalized.
- Two workers at the Milan
McDonald's tested positive for Hepatitis A but those tests came back a month ago.
- Even though the first case was
confirmed back in mid-June, the Rock Island County Health Department
didn't close the McDonald's until this past Wednesday.
- The health department now says
it didn't respond back then because it didn't know back then. The health
department says it didn't find out about the case on June 9th until July
10th, a month later because the provider who diagnosed a Milan
McDonald's employee with Hepatitis A back on June 9th did not report
that case as required. As a result, another month went by before steps
could be taken.
- The Health Department says in
addition to the two confirmed cases at the Milan McDonalds, there are
also confirmed
Hepatitis A cases involving other local businesses.
From the Quad-City Times - Rock
Island County to set up hepatitis A vaccination clinic Monday, Tuesday
- The Rock Island County Health
Department will offer vaccination clinics Monday and Tuesday at Rock
Island High School for those people who dined at a Milan, Ill.,
McDonald's restaurant connected to a recent hepatitis A outbreak. The
clinics will be from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Hepatitis A vaccine will be given
to people ages 1-40, while immune globulin will be administered to
people under 1 year of age or over 40 years of age. Eligible recipients
of the vaccines are those who consumed food or beverages at the Milan
McDonald's from July 6-10 and July 13-14.
- If a person receives the
vaccine or immune globulin more than 14 days after they have eaten at
the Milan McDonald's, it might not provide protection.
- The county has procured enough
Hepatitis A vaccine and immune globulin to vaccinate between 5,000 and
10,000 people who may have dined at the restaurant during the specified
time periods.
So, there has been Hepatitis
A at McDonalds since at least late May (ill worker diagnosed July 9 would
have been infectious weeks earlier). And, that worker likely infected
the other worker and customers over weeks.
One wonders why the
physician who diagnosed the worker in June did not alert authorities?
One wonders if management
at the Milan McDonalds knew the worker to be sick?
One wonders why it took
Rock Island County Health Department so long to get IG shot prepared?
Posted
on July 18, 2009 by Hepatitis A Attorney
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