Crypto outbreak spreads

Northeast Kansas on heightened alert for parasite

Topeka ? An outbreak of cryptosporidiosis in Douglas County has spread to five nearby counties. And the expanding outbreak prompted health officials Friday to heighten warnings across the region.

“Right now, we know we have an outbreak. There is no question about that,” said Dr. Gianfranco Pezzino, state epidemiologist for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.

He said 103 people now have contracted the illness, including 86 in Douglas County.

Pezzino said neighboring state health departments had been alerted to the Kansas outbreak, letters were going to physicians statewide and Kansas officials were expanding their “active surveillance” of cases in a 24-county area of northeast Kansas.

Also Friday, the Great Wolf Lodge water park in Wyandotte County shut down temporarily because three people may have become ill with cryptosporidiosis after swimming there, officials said.

On the recommendation of the state and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, management at the water park hyperchlorinated the water in an attempt to kill any remaining parasite. The park reopened late Friday afternoon.

Douglas County epicenter

Meanwhile, in Douglas County, the number of crypto cases has reached 86, according to Douglas County health officials; the first case was reported in late July.

Seventeen more cases have been reported in Johnson, Shawnee, Jefferson, Leavenworth and Wyandotte counties. Of those, five cases have possible links to cases in Douglas County. Last year, there were 16 cases total in the entire state, officials said.

From left, Kay Kent, director of Lawrence-Douglas County Health Department; Gianfranco Pezzino, state epidemiologist; and Sharon Wilson, of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, discuss the spread of cryptosporidiosis in northeast Kansas during a news conference Friday in Topeka.

Cryptosporidium is a one-celled parasite that attacks the digestive system causing diarrhea, vomiting and stomach cramps. It is transferred from fecal-oral contact through person-to-person contact, water and food.

Symptoms normally last two weeks or less, but the illness can be severe and even fatal for those with weakened immune systems. In the current outbreak, no one has been hospitalized, Pezzino said.

Health officials believe the disease has been spread through public swimming pools and day-care centers and has affected mostly children. Of the 86 cases in Douglas County, 54 were people 18 years old or younger.

“Children with diarrhea don’t belong in a day-care center,” Pezzino said. He added that the best prevention was for people to wash their hands with soap and water after going to the bathroom or changing a diaper.

In Douglas County, three-fourths of the cases are believed to have had some association with day-care centers, and more than half were possibly linked to both day care and swimming pools, officials said.

Pezzino noted there was no evidence to suspect public drinking water.

Under fire

Kay Kent, director of the Lawrence-Douglas County Health Department, said as many as eight cases have been linked to a single day care in Douglas County. Citing state law, she declined to identify the business.

She said health officials have visited all day-care centers where cases were suspected and reviewed their diaper-changing routines and policies on refusing to allow children with diarrhea.

“I think they are doing a pretty good job,” Kent said. She said no fines or other enforcement actions were being taken against any day cares.

Pezzino said he thought the number of cases in Douglas County was “tapering off.”

Health officials have been under fire for knowing about crypto cases in late July but not alerting the public for nearly a month.

But Pezzino said officials reacted properly.

“I think we have been as aggressive as we possibly could. The action that you take when you have a large outbreak like now is different from the options that you take when you have a few isolated cases,” he said.

Health officials said physicians in northeast Kansas were being told to test for crypto in any patient that has had diarrhea for three days or more. In addition, KDHE will start testing all specimens it receives for the disease.