A case of polio has been identified in a suburb of New York City and confirmed by health officials, the New York State Department of Health said on Thursday, the first case of the disease detected in the United States in at least least 30 years.
Tests suggest that the case of the highly contagious virus found in Rockland County may have originated outside the country, the department said in a statement.
“We are monitoring the situation closely and working with the New York Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to respond to this urgent public health issue, to protect the health and well-being of county residents,” Rockland County Health Commissioner Patricia Schnabel Ruppert said in a statement.
The CDC, which confirmed the case, said that no polio case had originated in the United States since 1979. However, the virus has since been brought into the country by travelers with the disease. The last time this happened was in 1993, the CDC said.
The symptoms of polio are flu-like and include a sore throat, fever, tiredness and nausea, the CDC said.
Polio invades the nervous system and can cause irreversible paralysis within hours. The disease has no cure, but the infection can be prevented by vaccination.
A substantial reduction in global cases of the disease in recent decades has been due to intense national and regional vaccination campaigns in infants and children.
In the late 1940s, when vaccines against the disease were not yet available, outbreaks of the virus left an estimated 35,000 Americans with disabilities each year, especially children who lived in areas with poor sanitation coverage.
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