Iowa experiencing mumps epidemic

WSYX 6 News ^ | March 31, 2006

[Flavius Josephus]

My Mom told me that when she was a kid when a neighbor kid got the measles, all the other moms in the neighborhood would bring their kids in to get exposed. That way they all got it over with at once.

[me-here]

This is the first I heard of this</i>

[Flavius Josephus]

A cough! A cough! Consumption be done about it? (olde joke)

[firewalk]

Mom made me keep socks on my hands to keep from scratching.

yeah...
like those socks stayed on...
lol

[Velveeta]

"We're trying to figure out why is it happening, why is it happening in Iowa and why is it happening right now. We don't know," she said.

CDC spokeswoman Lola Russell said the federal agency has no answers yet. But Quinlisk said one theory is that the infection was brought over from England _ perhaps by a college student _ because the strain seen in Iowa has been identified by the CDC as the same one that has caused tens of thousands of cases of the mumps in a major outbreak in Britain over the past two years.

"It may have been a college student, since we did see the first activities on college campuses, but we can't prove that,"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/31/AR2006033101016.html

[Flavius Josephus]

My mom put this funny looking thing like an upside down lampshade around my neck so I couldn't reach my face to scratch.

[null and void]

I can guess where they came from. Same people who returned resistant TB to this country.

They're just spreading the diseases Americans won't spread...

[Liberty Valance]

I remember having chicken pox. I hated those.

We currently have an outbreak of chicken pox in our local grade school here in small town Texas.

[mlc9852]

You're right. I know some refuse to get their kids vaccinated. Mistake, IMHO.

[lysie]

I had to Google that.

[OB1kNOb]

....or whopping cough........;-)

[null and void]

Hmmm, what group of ppl would not have had the shots mandatory in the USA?

Or perhaps are carrying a strain the current vaccine doesn't protect against?

[andysandmikesmom]

I think South Park did an episode along those lines...one of the kids got chicken pox, and right away, all the other moms brought their kids over, so that they would all also get chicken pox, and get it over in one big swoop...did not really watch the episode, for some reason or another, but I do think that was the jist of it..

[xarmydog]

Same here.All six of us siblings got all that.The cure?Mom and her 'doctoring'.Doctors were out of the picture cause we weren't very well off.The advantage was,you got spoiled a lot,had all the jello,pudding ,soup,you could handle!Of all,the mumps really sucked!Measles,chickenpox,all were the norm at the time.We usually caught it at school.

[firewalk]

My mom put this funny looking thing like an upside down lampshade around my neck so I couldn't reach my face to scratch.

you're making this up as you go along...
aren't you...

[null and void]

NO ONE said Mexicans until you brought it up. Are you a racist?

[lysie]

Oh my! They use those things on dogs and cats. Poor you! ;-)

[johnny7]

I had a friend in grammar school who got it... missed a lot of school recouping from it. As far as I know... he didn't have any heart damage.

[joesnuffy]

Don't just blame Mexicans it could also be OTM illegal alien invaders who are obviously not screened for infectious diseases..nor are their children...who are bringing diseases America once eradicated..back into America's schools...

5 cases being the norm... & a large influx of illegals in Iowa

The odds favor this being a distinct possiblity...

[digger48]

I DID have the messles