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The Centre for Health Protection (CHP) of the Department of Health is investigating a cluster of measles cases involving five persons from a sheltered workshop in Wan Chai.
The affected persons comprised three men and two women aged between 22 and 44. One of them, a 37-year-old woman is an inmate of a hostel for the mentally handicapped in Southern District.
The 37-year-old woman was noted to have symptoms of measles including fever, cough, runny nose, red eyes and skin rash on March 20. She sought medical attention from the Accident and Emergency Department of Queen Mary Hospital on the same day.
Blood sample taken from her yielded positive result for measles infection on March 30.
CHP staff visited the sheltered workshop and the hostel on March 31 and took blood samples from five workers of the workshop who developed rash in the past three weeks.
Results of laboratory tests available today (April 1) confirmed that blood samples taken from four of them yielded positive results for measles infection.
The management of the sheltered workshop has been advised to temporarily suspend activities in the workshop.
Another attendee of the sheltered workshop who is an inmate of a hostel in Sheung Wan also developed rash on March 28. Laboratory result for measles infection is pending.
To prevent possible spread of measles in the workshop and the two hostels concerned, MMR vaccination is being arranged for attendees of the three establishments.
The CHP have put all the staff members and inmates of the sheltered workshop and the two hostels under medical surveillance.
A CHP spokesman said measles is one of the most highly communicable infectious diseases. It is spread by droplets or by direct contact with nasal or throat secretions of infected persons and less commonly, by articles soiled with nose and throat secretions.
The incubation period ranges from seven to 18 days and patient can pass the disease to other persons from beginning of the disease to four days after appearance of the rash.
¡°There is no specific treatment and patients usually recover on their own. Case fatality rate is less than one per cent,¡± the spokesman said.
To prevent infection of measles, the spokesman called on members of the public to adopt the following measures:
* Maintain good personal and environmental hygiene;
* Maintain good indoor ventilation;
* Keep hands clean and wash hands properly;
* Wash hands when they are dirtied by respiratory secretions e.g. after sneezing;
* Cover nose and mouth while sneezing or coughing and dispose of nasal and mouth discharge properly;
* Cleanse used toys and furniture properly;
* Vaccination against measles is the most effective preventive measure. In Hong Kong, 2-dose measles vaccination progarmme is adopted, and children are given the MMR at one-year-old and in Primary 1;
* Children with measles should be kept out of school till four days from the appearance of rash to prevent spread of the infection to non-immune persons in school.
Ends/Saturday, April 1, 2006
Issued at HKT 19:01
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