A Hepatitis A Outbreak Is Growing but More Slowly
Though the case count in San Diego hepatitis A outbreak increased Monday again, officials said that the number of new infections continues to slow.
In a demonstration to the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, Dr. Wilma Wooten, the county's public health officer, revealed a graph that indicated there were 31 cases in October, considerably fewer than the 81 reported in September and 94 in August which saw the greatest total of the outbreak thus far.
Board seat Dianne Jacob needed a to-the-point question after viewing the chart.
"Is it getting better, the same or worse?" Jacob asked.
"We feel it's getting better," Wooten replied.
The case total of the outbreak was bumped by the latest update to 544, eight more than the 536. The number of deaths did not increase, remaining at 20 a week, following a death was reported.
Though the county has been supplying hospitalization, death and case updates, there has been some confusion, even one of the Board of Supervisors, about exactly what those numbers mean.
Supervisor Ron Roberts noted that the escalation in cases in deaths provides the people the feeling that, each time there develops a tally, that usually means the outbreak has grown.
But that's not the case. Since numbers aren't added to outbreak totals till they've been confirmed by testing which can take weeks to do, the weekly numbers are not an ideal barometer of this outbreak severity.
Roberts directed officials with the county Health and Human Services Agency to find a way to provide the public a better sense of how many cases have occurred since the last upgrade.
"It seems to me we can provide a much clearer picture by organizing our material a bit better so that people like me may understand this and get a better feel for what's happening," Roberts stated.
Wooten said during her demonstration Monday that the number of cases has continued to decline.
"The number of cases that are being reported every day today has recently decreased to one or two a day in comparison to three or even more a day," Wooten said.
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