Local News in Brief : Anti-Measles Campaign
Los Angeles County health officials called for a stepped-up immunization campaign to protect children from what they called the county’s worst measles outbreak in four years.
Dr. Stephen H. Waterman, chief of the acute communicable disease unit of the Department of Health Services, urged that children receive measles shots at 12 months of age rather than 15 months, the previously recommended age.
More than 200 cases of measles have been reported this year, with almost two-thirds of the cases involving children under age 5, Waterman said. By mid-July of 1987, there were only 30 cases.
Waterman said the outbreak is centered in South Los Angeles, Bellflower and Cerritos although cases have been reported elsewhere.
One death has been reported, and at least a dozen other children have been hospitalized, Waterman said, adding that Latino children have been particularly hard hit by the disease.
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