Measles scare over lightning strike survivor
Posted
Western Australia's Department of Health is trying to contact people who may have come into contact with a 16-year-old boy who is infected with measles.
The teenager survived a lightning strike that killed five people in Thailand.
He returned on Wednesday last week with teachers and students from Perth's Winthrop Baptist College on a Royal Brunei Airlines plane.
He also attended the funeral for one of those killed on Friday.
The Health Department's Paul Effler says a number of people may be at risk of getting the measles.
"Most people on the plane and most of the people that attended the funeral gathering are immune either through natural infection if they're older," he said.
"We're just worried because this student wasn't vaccinated so there might be others in the cohort that weren't vaccinated as well and they would be at risk.
"For the people on the flight it would be important especially for those parents that were travelling with a child too young to be vaccinated to contact the Health Department because we have a small window in which we might be able to provide them with immune globulin to prevent them getting ill.
