Oddly, there’s been a few recent outbreaks of measles. It struck me how when I was a kid, a few hundred kids getting measles wouldn’t have been news at all. However, even a handful makes the news now, since in 2000 the Center for Disease Control declared measles eradicated in the United States.

So how can an eradicated disease come back? How did we eradicate it to start with? The answers tell a pretty interesting tale of science applying to everyday life.

Historically

The first written account of measles appears to be from a 9th century Persian doctor. It would be 1757 before a Scottish physician showed it is caused by infection. By 1912, the United States started tracking the disease as an average of 6,000 people a year were dying from it in the US. It was particularly deadly to communities that had no exposure. In 1529, a measles outbreak killed two thirds of the population of Cuba. Later, it wiped out half the population of Honduras and also ravaged the Incans. In the 1800s, Measles wiped out major portions of Hawaii and Fiji.

Of course, that was before there was a vaccine. Before the 1963 introduction of the vaccine, virtually all children got measles — up to 4 million cases of it occurred each year in the US. Thanks to better medical care than was available in 1912, roughly 500 people a year would die, but nearly 50,000 a year would be hospitalized and around 1,000 would suffer from brain swelling as a side effect.

If you are below a certain age, you’ve probably never had measles or even seen a case of it. It is highly contagious and about 10 days after you are exposed, you’ll break out. High fever, cough, runny nose, and inflamed eyes are all symptoms. You’ll also likely get white spots in your mouth. But the trademark symptom is red spots on your face that spread to the rest of your body. The whole thing should be done in 10 days or less.

The virus is airborne and if you are not immune, you have a 90% chance of contracting it if someone in your living space has it. One infected person can infect 10-12 people on average. Compare that to the flu where the infection rate is 1-2 people. However, typically, if you have it once, you are immune from future exposure, although exposure elevates your risk of death from other causes for a few years.

Vaccine

In 1954 there was a measles outbreak in Boston. John Enders and Thomas Peebles collected blood from infected students and were able to isolate the virus in 11-year-old David Edmonston’s blood. By 1963 they had an effective vaccine. In 1968 the vaccine was improved by Maurice Hilleman and that vaccine is the same one you get today, usually with vaccines for mumps and rubella.

Enders was also instrumental …read more

Source:: Hackaday