Officials with the Salt Lake County Health Department have confirmed the county’s first measles case during the current national outbreak — and officials can’t say where the patient caught it, according to a news release Friday.
Gabriel Moreno, a spokesperson for the health department, said officials first learned of the case Wednesday afternoon, when they received positive lab results showing an unvaccinated adult was infected with the disease.
Wednesday evening and throughout Thursday, Moreno said the department investigated the case and interviewed the patient.
Despite those efforts, health officials said they weren’t able to figure out how the person caught the virus, according to the news release.
“This case is especially concerning because the source of the patient’s infection is unknown,” said Dorothy Adams, the health department’s executive director. “They have not knowingly had contact with anyone who had measles, which means their infection is the result of transmission somewhere out in the community.”
The person may have exposed others to the measles at Intermountain Health’s Taylorsville InstaCare at 3845 W. 4700 South in Taylorsville last Friday, Nov. 7, between 3-7:15 p.m., according to the news release.
Moreno said officials have made contact with most, if not all, of the individuals they know of who were exposed in the urgent care lobby.
Measles can linger in the air for up to two hours after an infected person leaves an area, according to the Salt Lake County Health Department. Because of this, officials advise anyone who was at the Taylorsville InstaCare during that time period to check their MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccination status.
If people have received one or two doses of the MMR vaccine, they are considered immune, according to the health department. After receiving two vaccines, officials say people are protected from measles infections 97% of the time.
Read more at sltrib.com.
This article is published through the Utah News Collaborative, a partnership of news organizations in Utah that aims to inform readers across the state.