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Mumps outbreak totals top 1,500 in New York, New Jersey
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A mumps outbreak that began last summer at a summer camp in New York has now affected more than 1,520 people in New York and New Jersey, and may be on the rise, according to a CDC report issued today.
The cases are almost exclusively among members of tradition-observant Jewish communities, with fewer than 3% of cases occurring outside these communities, CDC officials noted in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. The index case occurred in an 11-year-old boy who returned in mid-June from a trip to the United Kingdom.
Most of the cases are in school-aged boys, who attend separate schools from girls. Many of the patients have been vaccinated with one or two doses of measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine, though cases have also occurred in people who are unvaccinated or who have received one dose of MMR vaccine.
“Although the school settings and large household sizes might be promoting transmission, the high vaccination coverage in the affected community likely is limiting the size of the outbreak,” CDC researchers wrote. “In addition, high vaccination coverage in surrounding communities is the most plausible reason that the few cases outside of the affected community have not caused other outbreaks.” The researchers added that since 1967 — when the mumps vaccine was first licensed — to the early 2000s, the number of reported patients with mumps dropped from 186,000 to less than 500 annually. Nevertheless, mumps vaccine efficacy has varied in previous studies, ranging from 73% to 91% for one dose to 76% to 96% with two doses.
Nineteen people have been hospitalized but no deaths have been reported, CDC officials noted in their report.