20+ ill in Biloxi

[Solaris]

Patients Fall Ill, Miss. Shelter Closes
[AP Online]

BILOXI, Miss._Officials closed a shelter Saturday because more than 20 people there fell ill, and doctors believe the patients may have contracted dysentery from tainted water.

Another 20 people in the area also were treated for vomiting and diarrhea.

The shelter at a Biloxi school had been without water and power since Katrina hit Monday. About 400 people had been staying there, and doctors said some may have ignored warnings to stay away from water.

Some running water came back on late Friday, but it was not safe to drink or even to use to brush teeth or wash, said Dr. Jason Dees, a volunteer working at Biloxi Regional Medical Center.

Most of the patients were treated with antibiotics. About 30 ill residents were taken to a hospital in Mobile, Ala., while the rest were bused to a shelter in Thomasville, Ga.

Biloxi police Cpl. Kayla Robert said she had no idea what caused the illnesses.

"Who knows what they swallowed before they got here," she said. "Half of them were swimming in stuff that we don't even know what it was."

[soonertwister]

I've been worried about dysentery since day one. Nausea, vomiting and diarrhea are classic symptons. Dysentery is easily spread without strict hygienic control. In first world societies it is seldom fatal outside of disaster conditions or lack of medical care.

Otherwise, up to something like one in five face possible death, primaryily due to the disruption of normal electrolyte levels in human cells.

They need to have an emergency response to that situation, because dysentery can spread like wildfire, especially in crowded and unsanitary conditions.

It appears that they have responded appropriately though. Dysentery is almost never fatal with appropriate intervention. The thing that worries me is spreading dysentery without the ability to medically respond at the appropriate intervention level.

[baygirl_1]

Here's a story from our local newspaper about AL sending health workers to help in MS (also, there's info in there about patients from MS and LA at hospitals in our area):
Health workers head to Mississippi
Plan would divert hospital transfers away from Mobile
Saturday, September 03, 2005
By PENELOPE McCLENNY
Staff Reporter
Alabama Department of Public Health officials were dispatched to Mississippi this morning to organize patient transports from damaged hospitals, focusing on routing people to central and north Alabama facilities.

Since Tuesday, Mobile-area medical centers have received nearly 200 patients via helicopter, ambulance and bus from Mississippi hospitals that have been forced to close or lower their capacities due to power and water shortages.

Also, people from those areas who fled to Mobile before or after Hurricane Katrina are seeking treatment in local emergency rooms, gradually straining hospital resources.

Dr. Don Williamson, state health officer, said Alabama health workers will try to divert some of the transports from Mississippi to hospitals in Birmingham, Cullman and cities other than Mobile, allowing hospitals here to make more room for walk-in patients.

As of Friday, Mobile Infirmary had received at least 60 transported patients and was treating another 40 people who had made it to Mobile on their own from impacted areas, spokeswoman Joan Paine said.

Another 40 arrived at University of South Alabama hospitals, including 15 pediatric patients to Children's & Women's Hospital, spokesman Bob Lowry said.

A tour bus with 10 patients, most needing dialysis, arrived at Providence Hospital on Wednesday evening, spokesman Michael King said, and nine more arrived as of Friday.

At Springhill Medical Center, five transported patients came from Mississippi, spokeswoman Marian Faulk said.

Williamson said the number of storm refugees needing medical treatment will only increase in the days and weeks to come.

Earlier in the week, health department nurses were sent to Mobile emergency rooms, staging mini-triage areas for treatments such as tetanus shots and dressing minor cuts and scrapes in an attempt to get more serious cases treated faster.

"Every hospital has had patients drive up because they're displaced from their home. That's going to happen, and nobody's going to be able to help us with that," said Stan Hammac, chief of USA hospitals. That's why diverting more transports north is important, he and Williamson said.

Another component of the state's overall plan includes setting up long-term special needs sheltering for those patients who are well enough to be discharged from the hospital but still require specialized care.

On Friday, a special needs shelter opened at the Fairhope City Gym in Volanta Park, and Williamson said similar shelters will likely be opened in Birmingham, Montgomery and across the state.

"We're not talking a few weeks here," he said of providing care. "I think we're looking here at weeks and months."

With many, if not most, of these patients not having the ability to pay for their medical care, Williamson said, it will undoubtedly have a large financial impact on state and private resources, but officials haven't even begun to talk about expense yet, he said.

"In 20-plus years of public health, I've never seen anything like this," Williamson said.

In other health developments Friday:

Gov. Bob Riley issued an executive order extending the time limit on emergency prescriptions from 72 hours to 30 days, Williamson said, allowing those not from the area to get prescriptions refilled at local pharmacies by presenting their empty bottles.

A list of patients from storm-hit areas being treated at Alabama hospitals was posted online, helping families who may be looking for loved ones.

The list, which can be accessed at http://www.alaha.org, is being organized by the Alabama Hospital Association. The site also includes information about available jobs for health care workers whose workplaces may not be operational following the storm.

Here's the link to the story on al.com: http://www.al.com/news/mobileregister/index.ssf?/base/news/1125739015323390.xml&coll=3&thispage=2

[GalvestonDuck]

I wonder if anyone from the CDC, EPA, or anything like that has taken samples of the water in the various areas to test them and find out what all is in it now. I'm willing to bet someone's working on it already.

[soonertwister]

G-Duck, I'd pretty much say that everything is in that water. A lot of people are going to get sick, some long-term from prolonged exposure.

There are probably more than one thousand hazardous chemicals that are dispersed in those waters, and that doesn't even touch on the biologic contaminants.

[Mattie]

http://www.ag.uiuc.edu/~disaster/facts/waterbor.html

Disease and illness can be widespread as noted in this article.

[Mattie]

Another good link -

http://www.ag.uiuc.edu/~disaster/guide/g_facts.html

Along with the economic disaster comes the spread of illnesses. . . . this link has excellent information.

[Eye10TX]

Patients Fall Ill, Miss. Shelter Closes
[AP Online]

BILOXI, Miss._Officials closed a shelter Saturday because more than 20 people there fell ill, and doctors believe the patients may have contracted dysentery from tainted water.

Hmmm, it took five days, from Monday or Tuesday to Saturday for this to show up? And it was 20-40 out of 400, so 5-10% of the people there. No telling if it was from the newly running water in the shelter or from the water the victims were subjected to when the surge hit.

I just wonder how that would extrapolate to the enormous evacuee population now here in Houston. As of today, we had 4 doctors for every refugee being seen in triage (thanks to the SOS sent out 2 nights ago for more docs to come help), so I hope that means everyone who's pretty ill has been accommodated appropriately. OTOH, the stream of NOLA *survivors* (that's today's term for them) just keeps coming, so if it's going to spread, it's going to spread. Yikes.