Two more seniors die in 'garden variety' outbreak of mystery flu-like illn

Two more seniors die in 'garden variety' outbreak of mystery flu-like illness

TORONTO (CP) - Two more residents of an Toronto nursing home died Monday after a "garden variety" outbreak of a mysterious illness that has claimed a total of six lives and whose origins and precise nature may never be known, health officials say.

The deaths of two female residents of the Seven Oaks Home for the Aged brought to six the total number of people who have died since the outbreak began a week ago, affecting 68 residents, eight staff members and three visitors to the home.

The two women, 95 and 79, were both residents of the home and had other pre-existing medical conditions, Toronto medical officer of health Dr. David McKeown told a news conference.

But the outbreak, which McKeown described as a serious but "garden variety" occurrence in a long-term care facility, has nonetheless send a chill down the spine of a city that still remembers the devastation of its SARS outbreak two years ago.

http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/politics/news/shownews.jsp?content=n100363A

Doesn't that term suggest normal/common? Oxymoronic?

of multiple deaths from any one illness in a nursing home.

That's all too common, but "garden variety" IS a poor choice of phrasing.

From the same article:
McKeown said it's "quite common" for deaths to occur in long-term facilities given that the population tends to be frail and are often of compromised health.

"We see hundreds of outbreaks in Ontario every year in long-term-care facilities," he said. "It's certainly well within the range of what we see."

But after the pummeling that Toronto took on the tourism front, I would be a bit suspicious.

Especially after the US seemed to sideline any sars type of disease while Toronto took the full brunt for being perhaps "too honest".

Six more die from mystery illness at Toronto nursing home but no public risk

TORONTO (CP) - A mysterious respiratory disease afflicting a seniors' home poses no public health risk, officials said Wednesday as six more fatalities raised the death toll to 16 and made it the city's deadliest nursing home outbreak in at least five years.

"The outbreak is confined to residents and staff and people closely associated with this one facility, so it's not a general public health risk."

All the deaths have been among the mostly frail and elderly residents of the Seven Oaks Home for the Aged in the city's east end.

The latest victims were three men, aged 84, 75, 89 and three women, aged 96, 92 and 85.

http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/politics/news/shownews.jsp?content=n100569A

I love that show. Great detective/diagnostician work.

Back to the subject: scary stuff. I've heard the people have other serious health problems like COPD, asthma, and diabetes, but still, alot of people have health issues that something like this could affect.

to hear what exactly they did die from.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/10/05/mysterious-illness1004.html

The death toll from a mysterious respiratory disease afflicting a seniors' home in Toronto has increased to 16, making it the deadliest nursing home outbreak in at least five years.

Despite the increasing death toll, which officials said could still climb higher, Toronto's medical officer of health, Dr. David McKeown told a news conference on Wednesday the outbreak is winding down.

"This is not SARS," Dr. McKeown said. "The outbreak is confined to residents and staff and people closely associated with this one facility, so it's not a general public health risk," he said.

Dr. McKeown said the six new deaths are not new cases. He said "all of these elderly individuals had been previously identified as cases and had underlying medical conditions."



http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20051005/mystery_illness_051005/20051005?hub=TopStories

Meanwhile, the Greater Toronto Hotel Association has released a confidential memo to hotels in the city, urging them to be on alert that visitors and foreign media may pick up on the story and draw unwarranted comparisons to the SARS outbreak.

"The only threat here is if people get carried away with hysteria (or if the outbreak escalates significantly, but there appears no reason to suspect it will)," the memo says.'

"We can inform anyone who asks that we are monitoring the situation closely. Of course we can't appear to be dismissing it out of hand.

"But the biggest threat to tourism is not a respiratory outbreak, it's a hysteria outbreak. That's what we need to contain. We certainly do not want to make any comments that refer to SARS or "last time".

Ontario officials say nursing home outbreak likely legionnaires' disease

TORONTO (CP) - A mysterious outbreak at a nursing home that claimed 16 lives and stoked international fears about the safety of Canada's largest city was likely caused by legionnaires' disease, a form of pneumonia, public health officials said Thursday.

Autopsy results showed at least three of the deaths at the Seven Oaks Home for the Aged were directly linked to the disease, said infectious disease expert Dr. Donald Low, who gave briefings almost daily during Toronto's 2003 SARS crisis.

"We'll continue to look for other possibilities, but we feel pretty confident . . .we're dealing with legionnaires' disease," Low said.

Further autopsy results are pending, but Low rejected suggestions officials had been too slow in determining the cause of the deadly outbreak. He said dozens of urine tests for legionnaires were done early on, but all came back negative, and it wasn't until the autopsies were completed Thursday that legionnaires was confirmed.

http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/news/shownews.jsp?content=n100693A

then that nursing home could potentially be sued for heaps. This illness cannot be transmitted person to person. It is caught by breathing in the bacteria in an aerosol. The most common way the disease spreads is through people breathing contaminated water vapor from an evaporative air conditioning unit. Because this is a known hazard of air conditions, units in public places have strict regulations about the cleaning. (In Australia, anyway.)

"In its own habitat it is not known to be harmful to humans. It is only when it is found in man made situations that the bacteria can multiply in large quantities and become dangerous (only if the bacteria is breathed into the lungs).

"If inhaled, the bacteria may cause infection.
The disease is not transmitted from person to person.
Legionnaires disease does not occur from drinking contaminated water."

Places the bug can grow are:

"Cooling Towers
Evaporative Condensers
Spas
Whirlpools
Nebulisers
Humidicribs
Emulsified cutting fluids
Hot water systems
Potting mix
Decorative fountains
Ice Machines
Evaporative Coolers
Fire sprinkler systems"

http://www.multiline.com.au/~mg/legion1.html#ACommonOrganism

Probably won't mean much if the Home has no assets.

IIRC, I called this suspicious for Legionnaire's several days ago, and guess what it got confirmed as today: LEGIONNAIRE'S.

This is what a mind full of trivia is good for. It makes one a good guesser.

With 88 people affected, I had expected it to be something contagious.
Do you know how many residents were in the home? Something there must have been "aerosolising" a lot of bacteria to infect so many.

any staff or family members.............

HVAC systems, humidifiers, other equipment and devices with standing water in them..........Legionella thrives in the stagnant water. There are lots of regulations now about cleaning schedules for this sort of equipment in hospitals, nursing homes, hotels now IIRC.

CDC FAQs about Legionella for those who can't get enough factoids.

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/legionellosis_g.htm