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Los Angeles officials have pledged hundreds of thousands of dollars and created a task force to fight typhus, a city of glittering riches struggling with extreme poverty.
"We are deploying all available resources to help control and stop this epidemic," said Alex Comisar, press officer for Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.
Many of these resources have focused on the city's large homeless population, which is considered most at risk of contracting flea-borne disease. At the same time last year, California's homeless population was threatened by an epidemic of hepatitis A, another disease linked to poverty and inadequate sanitation, which killed 21 people and infected hundreds of them. .
Since the beginning of the year, 64 cases of typhus have been reported in the County of Los Angeles, which is higher than the 53 cases recorded at the same time last year and about to exceed 67. cases diagnosed last year. A spokesman for the Department of Public Health said the outbreak had begun with 11 cases of typhus in downtown Los Angeles, six of which were diagnosed in homeless people. Unlike hepatitis A, the form of typhus typically found in California is usually not fatal and can not be transmitted from person to person.
According to the most recent figures, 53,000 people are homeless in Los Angeles County, many in downtown Skid Row. The streets of Skid Row are lined with tents and sometimes littered with rubbish.
Chronic illness and hospitalization are common among Skid Row residents, many of whom have been forced into the streets because of rising rents in the city and lack of affordable housing. Homeless residents have no choice but to live near rats and other rodents, exposing the homeless and their pets to a risk of exposure to fleas and typhus. Lack of access to toilets and washing places can also contribute to the spread of the disease.
Sean Gregory, a Skid Row resident who works in a health center Neighborhood center, indicated that they had closed their doors for a few hours so that showers and other facilities could be treated with a noxious spray. But he, like other residents, said he did not hear much about the epidemic.
"It does not seem so bad here. I did not see any sign, "Gregory said. "I saw something on Facebook about it. I did not open the link. "
Dr. Timothy Brewer, professor of medicine, epidemiology and public health at UCLA, said, "It's an unusual disease." He said he observed a confirmed case of typhus during his six years of medicine in Los Angeles.
Some people may not even know that they have it. The most common symptoms are headaches, fever and sometimes rashes. They will often go away in a week or two, even without treatment, he said.
The likelihood of the average person contracting typhus – if they do not have pets inside or outside or do not live near a flea-carrying animal – is extremely low. Most of the inhabitants of the city, living under bridges or tents, are the poorest.
Los Angeles County voted this week to approve an emergency plan that would provide outreach workers with typhus prevention aids such as insect repellents and flea collars. The city is committed to spending $ 300,000 to further clean up the homeless camps.
The city is also committed to expanding and "scaling up" its regular clean-up program that it is already leading to Skid Row, called "Operation Healthy Streets." But sweeps are controversial. Supporters of the homeless have repeatedly sued the city for its cleanup methods, alleging that police and sanitarians routinely confiscate or ruin the property of the homeless.
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