Spread of whooping cough slows
At least 1,000 people given vaccinations in the last few weeks
Michele LeTourneau
Northern News Services
Monday, August 15, 2016
QIKIQTAALUK
Nunavut's chief medical officer of health, Kim Barker, is fairly confident the whooping cough outbreak that began in Pond Inlet in May and spread to Hall Beach and Iqaluit is now under control.
"From the last week, we're delighted to see that the number of new cases is dropping and certainly, when speaking with the health centres, there doesn't appear to be as many people showing up with respiratory illness," Barker told Nunavut News/North Aug. 11.
"And certainly we have no new cases in any other communities outside of these three."
As of Aug. 11, there were 29 confirmed cases in Iqaluit, 36 in Hall Beach and six in Pond Inlet, for a total of 71.
In May, Pond Inlet had a small outbreak of about 13 cases.
"So I think that the amazing work that happened in the last few weeks with regards to immunization has probably helped to reduce the spread. And hopefully we'll continue to see a drop in new cases," Barker said.
The department held clinics last week and the previous week which were really well attended, said Barker.
At least 1,000 vaccinations have been administered during that time.
This includes communities surrounding the three which saw the outbreaks.
"We're extremely grateful for the six nurses from Health Canada who dedicated their time to this," said Barker.
"They didn't go to the communities that had whooping cough. We actually targeted communities surrounding those communities to make sure we vaccinated the population to prevent the spread of the disease."
Infants under one year are the most vulnerable to severe respiratory illness.
"We've had a few," said Barker. "They're recovering."
Hall Beach, with a population under 1,000 people, suffered the highest rate of infection. Summer day camp had to be cancelled.
"Which was most unfortunate, it really was."
And with school starting up again soon in the Qikiqtaaluk region, efforts are going into ensuring all teachers returning for the school year are immunized.
"The Department of Education kindly, on our behalf, sent out letters to all the teachers asking them to check their vaccination status before they return to school in September. Again, just to mitigate the spread of illness among the kids."
The number of reported cases have fluctuated from day to day.
"When we have someone presenting to the health centre with symptoms consistent with whooping cough in communities where whooping cough is spreading, we typically call them a clinical case and we begin antibiotics but send the swab off for confirmation to Mississauga in Ontario, which takes as long as 10 days," said Barker.
A swab which comes back negative is removed from the list of people with whooping cough.
Other steps to contain whooping cough involved a public-awareness campaign on the importance of "hand-washing, good cough etiquette, not sharing spoons, knives, forks, cups to limit the spread."
