Here is Dr. Klotman’s Week 259 video address that focuses on Measles. This week’s highlights include:
COVID
- During the COVID-19 pandemic, 1-3% of people infected died
- The public response to this was two-fold
- The most vulnerable people wanted a vaccine to prevent unnecessary deaths
- The less vulnerable people were angry with lockdowns and restrictions
- The latter group, the 97%, were louder, of course
- The most prevalent COVID strain in the US now is LP.8.1 – unseating XEC as the dominant variant
- LP.8.1 is a minor variant of XEC, and the latest vaccine should protect against it
Measles
- Nine of ten unvaccinated people exposed to Measles will become infected
- Childhood vaccination rates were excellent until the COVID pandemic; then they fell precipitously – this is not news; it was documented during the pandemic itself
- During the pandemic, childhood vaccine exemptions rose most in Red States
- Among 10,000 children who contract Measles
- 2,000 will be hospitalized
- 500 will develop Measles pneumonia
- 1,000 will develop deafness
- 10 will develop Measles encephalitis and will likely die
- Among 10,000 children vaccinated for Measles
- 3 will develop febrile seizures which will resolve and cause no permanent deficit
- 1 in a hundred thousand will develop a life-threatening allergic reaction
- Viruses move about easily, and that is why USAID’s work is so important – because of Measles, Mpox, HIV, Polio, Ebola, and other viral illness just one international flight away from us
Influenza
- 2024 has been the highest severity Flu season since 2017
- So far, there have been 37 million cases with 480K hospitalizations, and 21K deaths including 98 children
- Regarding H5N1 bird flu, there is still no documented case of human-to-human transmission
- The current Flu epidemic is waning, as it often does in March and April