this post was submitted on 23 Feb 2024
265 points (98.5% liked)

Health - Resources and discussion for everything health-related

2060 readers
400 users here now

Health: physical and mental, individual and public.

Discussions, issues, resources, news, everything.

See the pinned post for a long list of other communities dedicated to health or specific diagnoses. The list is continuously updated.

Nothing here shall be taken as medical or any other kind of professional advice.

Commercial advertising is considered spam and not allowed. If you're not sure, contact mods to ask beforehand.

Linked videos without original description context by OP to initiate healthy, constructive discussions will be removed.

Regular rules of lemmy.world apply. Be civil.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

With a brief memo, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo has subverted a public health standard that's long kept measles outbreaks under control.

On Feb. 20, as measles spread through Manatee Bay Elementary in South Florida, Ladapo sent parents a letter granting them permission to send unvaccinated children to school amid the outbreak.

The Department of Health "is deferring to parents or guardians to make decisions about school attendance," wrote Ladapo, who was appointed to head the agency by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose name is listed above Ladapo's in the letterhead.

Ladapo's move contradicts advice from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"This is not a parental rights issue," said Scott Rivkees, Florida's former surgeon general who is now a professor at Brown University. "It's about protecting fellow classmates, teachers, and members of the community against measles, which is a very serious and very transmissible illness."

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago (1 children)

For comparison: the R∅ of the 1918 Spanish flu was estimated to be between 1.4 and 2.8.

Early-COVID was estimated around 2 as well.

[–] NotMyOldRedditName 2 points 4 months ago

Covids less even now, but you become infectious so much sooner that it actually spreads faster.

You can get 3-5 generations of covid before the first generation of measels is contagious