The situation with the measles outbreak in Latvia is serious, said Baiba Rozent\u0101le, head of the Latvian Infectology Centre, in an interview on Latvian Television\u2019s programme \u201cR\u012bta panor\u0101ma.\u201d<\/p>\n
She predicts that the situation is likely to develop \u201cnot so well,\u201d as data from the Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (SPKC) show that around 14,000 children under the age of 17 have not received a single measles vaccine dose.<\/p>\n
The specialist emphasized that measles is a highly contagious and serious disease, spreading through respiratory droplets that can remain airborne for up to two hours. Infected individuals remain contagious for a prolonged period, Rozent\u0101le explained.<\/p>\n
She assessed the situation as serious but also expected, noting that measles outbreaks have been occurring across Europe over the past decade due to various factors, largely insufficient vaccination coverage.<\/p>\n
As previously reported, Latvia has registered its first measles outbreak since 2018.<\/p>\n
As of the 17th of March, five cases have been recorded, including three laboratory-confirmed cases \u2014 two among schoolchildren and one adult \u2014 as well as two suspected cases in schoolchildren, with test results still pending. All cases are epidemiologically linked.<\/p>\n
As SPKC representative Ilze \u016adre previously told LETA, the number of identified contacts is very high \u2014 at least 800 individuals. These include contacts identified in educational institutions, as well as outside them, such as in patients\u2019 families, public events, international transport, and elsewhere.<\/p>\n
\u016adre also acknowledged that the risk of further spread, particularly among unvaccinated individuals, is considered high. Moreover, it is not possible to identify all contacts, especially incidental ones in public places.<\/p>\n
The SPKC has identified that one of the infectious individuals travelled on an \u201cEcolines\u201d bus on the Riga\u2013Gulbene\u2013Riga route. On the 13th of March, the person travelled from Riga to Gulbene on a bus departing at 8:00 from Riga Bus Station, and on the 15th of March returned to Riga on a bus departing from Gulbene Bus Station at 13:50.<\/p>\n
The SPKC urges all passengers who travelled on these routes to contact epidemiologists via the 24-hour hotline +371 67 271 738 or by email at dezurants.riga@spkc.gov.lv to assess potential exposure and receive further guidance.<\/p>\n
Read also: Measles outbreak begins in Latvia, risk assessed as high<\/a><\/p>\n Follow us on\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0X<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The situation with the measles outbreak in Latvia is serious, said Baiba Rozent\u0101le, head of the Latvian Infectology…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[91],"tags":[24753,332,24754,24755,169,24756,168,24757,24758],"class_list":["post-43523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-riga","tag-baiba-rozentale","tag-featured","tag-ilze-udre","tag-infectious-diseases","tag-latvia","tag-measles","tag-riga","tag-spkc","tag-vaccination"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116255388324258943","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}