Several children in Brooklyn were diagnosed with measles this month — after one of them came back from a trip to Israel with the disease and exposed the others to it, city health officials said.
The Health Department confirmed six cases of the highly contagious viral infection in Williamsburg’s Orthodox Jewish community. The affected children range in age from 11 months to 4-years-old.
Five of the kids weren’t vaccinated — four because their shots were delayed and one who was too young to get the vaccine. The sixth child was vaccinated, but the immunization hadn’t kicked in yet.
“Although measles is preventable, too many families are choosing to not vaccinate or delay vaccination, putting their children and other children at risk” said Acting Health Commissioner Dr. Oxiris Barbot.
Of the kids affected in Brooklyn, one has since been sent to the hospital with pneumonia and another one has had an ear infection as a result of measles.
Nearly a dozen people in New York state outside of the city also have measles — at least five of them who picked up the disease during travel to Israel, officials said.
There’s currently an outbreak of the disease in the country — with 341 cases so far in Jerusalem, Haaretz reported.
The Health Department held a meeting in Williamsburg Thursday with rabbis and elected officials to raise awareness about the disease and how to protect children against it.
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