Louisianans rarely turn down an opportunity to celebrate, but in light of a recent measles outbreak in Texas, experts warn parents against “measles parties,” should infections spread to Louisiana.
“In the simplest of terms, it’s an absolutely horrible idea,” said Dr. Kali Broussard, a pediatrician and pediatric disease specialist with Our Lady of Lourdes Children’s Health who runs a practice in Maurice.
Measles parties are an attempt by parents to intentionally expose their children to an infected person to build natural immunity. The idea is similar to chickenpox parties that were common before the chickenpox vaccine.
Building immunity by exposure is unsafe, Broussard noted, and can cause serious complications and even death. While the measles, mumps and rubella or MMR vaccine, which has been around since the 1970s, contains a live version of the virus, it’s significantly weaker than the virus present in an infected patient, preventing the vaccine from causing a full-blown disease.
“You’re bringing your kid to a measles party or a chickenpox party, you're not getting a weakened version of that virus, you're getting the full-strength measles virus that kills children,” Broussard said.
The U.S. measles outbreak so far has claimed the life of one child, and infected at least 222 people, 33 of whom were hospitalized. The outbreak has also spread from Texas to neighboring New Mexico. Louisiana has not yet seen any infections, but it’s not unlikely that infections may cross the state line.
In a press call, Republican U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, a gastroenterologist from Baton Rouge who worked on hepatitis B vaccination efforts before entering politics, said the measles outbreak “is moving across the I-10, and it’s now in San Antonio, which means it’s moving to us.
“By golly, if it’s coming down the I-10, it’s gonna be in Houston, it’s gonna be in Lake Charles,” he said. “It’s gonna be in Laffy and Baton Rouge, and then it’s gonna go up the I-49 to Shreveport.”
Many Louisiana families make a living in the oil and gas industry, which has deep ties to West Texas, the center of the current measles outbreak.
“There is definitely a chance that it will make its way from West Texas to South Louisiana, just with the proportion of our families that work there,” Broussard said.
Many physicians today, including some of those treating children currently infected in Texas, have spent their entire career without ever seeing a measles patient in real life. Measles was considered eliminated in the United States in 2000, thanks to the highly effective vaccine and high vaccination rates.
But the virus has experienced a resurgence in recent years due to growing vaccine hesitancy. During her medical fellowship in Columbia, Missouri, Broussard witnessed an outbreak firsthand.
“Children just really feel very ill,” Broussard said of the patients she saw. “You feel like you can't help them.”
Unlike other viral infections, there’s no antiviral treatment for measles.
While Vitamin A supplements can help replenish supplies in the body that were depleted by the disease, and fluids and other supportive care can ease symptoms somewhat, the young patients are often bleary-eyed from extremely high fevers and one in five children are hospitalized as a result of the infection. Children admitted with measles can also suffer pneumonia, respiratory failure and potentially fatal brain infections.
The long-term effects of the disease can be even more devastating. Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis is a rare neurological disorder that can develop years after a measles infection, as the virus continues to lay dormant in the brain. SSPE leads to developmental disabilities and is always fatal, with most patients dying within one to three years after receiving their diagnosis.
Broussard put the consequences for parents in blunt terms: “You may not kill that kid immediately, but 10 years later, they may then die from the measles.”
Parents who consider intentionally exposing their children to the virus in a group setting should keep those risks in mind, Broussard emphasized, not just for the sake of their own children. “You could potentially kill another child,” she said. Legal experts warn that there may also be legal consequences to hosting or attending “measles parties”.
Instead, Broussard joined the choir of many other medical experts urging parents to vaccinate their children before the virus arrives in Louisiana.
“The measles vaccine (known as MMR) has proven to be safe and effective, and I recommend it to my patients," Louisiana Surgeon General Ralph Abraham, also a physician, said in a social media post Tuesday. “Adults and children should consider getting the vaccine if they haven’t already received it. Be sure to talk to your doctor before making that decision."
Abraham said the Louisiana Department of Health "is on alert and ready to respond if the virus spreads to Louisiana.”
In a public-private partnership led by the nonprofit Louisiana Immunization Initiative, Our Lady of Lourdes is offering discounted shots for children on Saturday, March 15, from 9 a.m. to noon at the Children’s Specialty Center on the campus of Our Lady of Lourdes Women’s & Children’s Hospital. Any child under the age of 18 is eligible at a cost of $10 per child.
“Please protect your children, not only from measles, but from the devastating after effects of measles,” Broussard urged parents. “The reason why we vaccinate is because vaccines work.”
