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00:00We're here to confirm that a patient has passed away from complications caused by
00:05the measles virus. The child was school-aged and did not reside in Lubbock
00:10County. We do want to say our thoughts and prayers are with this family. We've
00:15seen about 20 patients who required hospitalization and with confirmed
00:20measles as well as a handful of patients who presented to our emergency
00:25department but did not require ongoing hospitalization. They've ranged in ages
00:32from infants, school-aged children predominantly, and some older children as
00:37well. And what we see with these patients is really what we see classically with
00:43measles. So in general the clinical presentation of measles is one that has
00:49high fever associated with it and then a constellation of respiratory symptoms
00:54red watery eyes, significant nasal congestion, and cough are the hallmark
01:01symptoms and then proceeding with a rash. And that rash is pretty characteristic
01:06starts generally on the face and then spreads down the body. One of the
01:12questions that I get asked a lot is why have patients needed to be in the
01:15hospital in this situation? And the answer is really because of those
01:21respiratory symptoms. Measles is a respiratory virus that causes a viral
01:27pneumonia that may necessitate some extra support for those patients. Sure
01:33first of all you know measles is a deadly virus you know as we just talked
01:39about so measles can be very dangerous. The predominant issues that we talk
01:44about and certainly that have led patients to be admitted to the hospital
01:47are those respiratory issues and so that is is a frequent cause of death.
01:54There are also neurologic issues that can happen acutely, encephalitis, swelling
02:00of the brain, blindness, other other issues along that line that can also be
02:05a part of acute measles. We were confident that we'd eradicated measles
02:10from the United States and had really gotten to a point where we just didn't
02:14see these kinds of outbreaks happening. Obviously that has changed and over the
02:20last 20-something years and so we do see outbreaks more frequently but that
02:26that is related to how much we're vaccinating our population. When we think
02:31of about vaccine preventable illnesses they're only preventable if we have
02:36adequate vaccination rates and as we see those rates start to decline you know
02:42across the nation and then we'll see more outbreaks.