Issaquah HS Closed After Measles Exposure

ISSAQUAH, WA — State health officials are watching an uptick of measles cases in Puget Sound, including one case in a woman who works at Issaquah High School. The district closed the school on Thursday under guidance of local health officials to give staff time to check their immunization records.

Local and state health officials said Wednesday that four measles cases have been confirmed in Pierce, King, and Snohomish counties — and they cited Sea-Tac Airport as a possible common link.

Two of the cases are in King County and are in addition to a case reported May 4 involving a traveler from British Columbia. Pierce and Snohomish counties each have one confirmed case, according to health officials.

The Issaquah School District has alerted parents district-wide about the local connection. According to King County Public Health, the staff member was at the school on May 6 for the entire day, 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. A measles patient also traveled to a meeting in the Hunters Ridge community in Sammamish on May 10 between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.

The district is advising parents to monitor their kids, district communications director L. Michelle said on Wednesday. Michelle did not know if the staff member had recovered from measles. King County said the two local patients are a woman in her 50s and a woman in her 40s.

Those two patients traveled through Sea-Tac Airport recently, health officials said. On Sunday, Pierce County health officials revealed a confirmed case in a man from the Orting area. He traveled to Sea-Tac on four separate occasions while contagious.

"Investigators are exploring a possible common exposure at SeaTac Airport. All of the newly announced cases spent time at SeaTac Airport during their likely time of exposure or infectiousness," King County Public Health said in a statement on Wednesday.

Measles symptoms, like a rash, cough, and red, watery eyes, typically appear seven to 21 day after exposure. Measles can linger in the air in a closed space for as long as two hours.

As of May 15, 77 measles cases have been confirmed in Washington so far in 2019. Seventy-one of those cases were counted in an outbreak in Clark County over the winter. That outbreak is now over, state health officials say.