"I did not know I would expose measles to women and babies"

Staff at Tel Aviv's Ichilov Hospital fear that newborns have been infected with measles after a 42-year-old man spent a lot of time in the hospital's maternity ward, reported Yediot Aharonot.

Yoav Asif, a Tel Aviv resident and a new father, was diagnosed with measles shortly after the birth of his wife. Four days ago he stayed at the maternity ward where his wife was hospitalized. During this time, he began to develop a fever.

Asif went home, but two days later, a rash appeared on his face that spread quickly to the rest of the body. When the rash appeared, his family and children who learned in kindergarten were sent to receive the MMR vaccine, which protects against measles.

The list of people who came into contact with Asif includes all the people who were at the nursery of the hospital, in the delivery room, in the maternity ward and in the other services of the hospital. hospital that he visited.

Yediot Aharonot quoted Asif: "Last Wednesday, I arrived at the hospital with my wife to give birth.I felt very tired, but I thought it was just the stress of birth, which was treated as an emergency. "

"In the morning, I woke up with a rash and realized that something was wrong," he said. "I ran to the Sheba emergency room, they took blood and urine and put me in quarantine, I obviously have nothing against them. vaccines, and I did not know that I was sick or likely to expose women and babies. "

"Measles is a disease that you can catch even if you walk around an empty room where a patient with measles spent time two hours ago.It is one of the most contagious diseases in the world."

In a statement, Ichilov said: "The incident occurred yesterday at the hospital was reported to the Ministry of Health.The local health department will contact the parents of babies who were at the hospital. time in the room so that they can receive the proper vaccinations.The few babies still hospitalized have been vaccinated today.There is no danger to babies, whether by the The hospital stressed that this incident was over and that it had no impact on women who are currently giving birth at the hospital. that the couple is in a private room, like most new mothers of Ichilov, has significantly reduced the exposure potential. "

Earlier this month, a new, unvaccinated mother contracted measles, exposing the nursery and maternity ward of the Poriya Medical Center.

In October, an unvaccinated father with measles visited Shaare Zedek's intensive care unit, exposing sixty preterm newborns to the deadly disease.

According to the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC), one in four patients with measles will be hospitalized because of complications. Measles affects one in twenty children who contact the disease and one in 1,000 encephalitis. Ear infections, which occur in one in ten children who contract measles, can lead to permanent hearing loss.

Measles can also cause pregnant women to miscarry, give birth prematurely, or give birth to a stillbirth or low birth weight.

According to the Ministry of Health's latest update, dated March 18, the number of measles cases in Israel had risen to 3,701. Since then, several other cases have been reported.

The vast majority of Israeli patients with measles were completely unvaccinated and a handful of them had received a single dose.