JOPLIN, Mo. —
Investigators with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will take a further look at the cluster of fungal infections that developed among nine severely injured victims of the May 22 tornado.
Kristen Nordlund, a spokeswoman for the federal agency, said investigators arrived in Missouri on Tuesday in response to a request for help in the investigation by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services.
In an email late Thursday, she said: “The CDC has deployed four employees, including two epidemiologists, to Joplin, to assist with an investigation on fungal disease. The team will be in Joplin for two weeks.
“The team will be gathering more information on suspected cases, as well as conducting a case-control study. In this instance, people who have contracted the fungus will be compared to those who have not contracted the fungus to determine if there are any risk factors associated with contracting the fungus.”
Jacqueline Lapine, spokeswoman for the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, on Thursday said, “As part of that coordinated effort going forward, the CDC will be the primary point of contact on questions regarding further testing and confirmation.”
The investigators had not spoken, as of Thursday afternoon, to either Dr. Uwe Schmidt, an infectious disease specialist with Freeman Health System, or Dan Pekarek, director of the Joplin Health Department.
Freeman has seen at least five cases of the fast-growing fungal infection. It is believed to have contributed to the deaths of three people there and one at St. John’s Regional Health Center in Springfield.
The rare infection, zygomycosis, can have a fatality rate of 50 percent.
The spores can infect people with traumatic injuries, but the fungal infections are rare in healthy people, and clusters of them are even more uncommon.
Deep skin fungal infection does not spread from human to human. No cases have been attributed to air, food or water.
To date, no cases of the fungus have been reported among workers in the damage zone.
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