Iowa Mumps Epidemic

From MedPage:

The number of mumps cases in Iowa has climbed to 365 cases, but schools and daycare centers have been spared, state health officials reported today.

Moreover, epidemiologist Meghan Harris, M.P.H., said the laboratory tests "confirm that we are still finding mumps virus, so this outbreak is still very active." Two hundred and ninety-six of 359 cases with completed serology are IgM-positive, she said.

Harris speculated that there are no reported outbreaks in schools and daycare centers because there have not yet been enough exposures or that children's recent vaccinations are protecting them. Most children receive their first mumps-measles-rubella (MMR) vaccination around age one and a second around age four. Children younger than one are still protected by immunity from their mothers."

Harris declined to estimate when the outbreak would peak, but she said that in the days "when mumps was endemic in Iowa, outbreaks were seasonal and tended to fade by late spring or early summer."