Transcript
Dr William Rainger from Auckland's Public Health Service says there were 25 more measles cases on Monday in the city.
He says the majority of new cases are still in South Auckland.
Dr Rainger says the age distribution pattern continues to be the same with measles mainly occuring in children under five years old.
"The greatest number of cases in any given week was in the last week of August. So we're still seeing fewer cases per week than that week in August. So that supports us continuing to be cautiously optimistic that we may have reached the peak of this outbreak."
But Dr Rainger says the lag effect of the school holidays and the two week incubation period of virus transmission may yet cause a further spike in numbers.
The authority has written an interim report analysing hospitalisations from the measles outbreak, to try and work out who is getting sick and what complications the disease is causing.
Dr Karen Bartholomew is the Director of Health Outcomes for the Waitematā and Auckland district health boards.
She says the current Auckland outbreak is the largest in twenty years.
Dr Batholemew says normal hospitalisation rates are predicted at 10 percent but during this outbreak 35 to 40 percent of people with measles are ending up in a hospital bed.
"The hospitalisation rate was much higher for those aged zero to four, which we did expect, and that's 52 percent, so certainly much higher. Hospitalisation rate for Maori was 41 percent, and for Pacific was 37, so also higher for those groups. And Counties Manukau had the highest number of hospitalisations and that was expected also."
Dr Bartholomew says the high admission rate may in part be because more measles cases are in young children under 4 years old.
She says all patients needing hospital care are considered serious by those analysing the data, but 22 percent were categorised as further complicated cases needing a longer hospital stay.
Sixty five people became sick with pneumonia from their measles infection and three of those patients also developed encephalitis with these rates higher than expected for both conditions.
There have not been any deaths from measles complications.
But five pregnant women were hospitalised in Auckland with two foetal losses potentially related to maternal measles.
Dr Rainger says sadly stillbirths, miscarrages and low birth weight, are all possible complications of measles in pregnancy.
He says it's understandably worrying for the pregnant women of Auckland.
"But I want to make it quite clear that the likelihood of a woman who's pregnant being exposed to measles and their risk of developing measles is no greater than any other person in the Auckland population. And so any individual is at relatively low risk of actually developing measles."
Dr Rainger says says pregnant women concerned about measles should seek advise from their lead maternity provider and family doctor.
Another 100,000 doses of the measles vaccine are expected to arrive into New Zealand soon.
But Babies under six months old, pregnant women, and people with compromised immune systems cannot be vaccinated and rely on herd immunity.
The World Health Organisation says people planning to travel from Auckland to the Pacific Islands should get immunised two weeks before leaving.
