The initial exposure to the virus was never identified.In 2015, a U.S. woman in Washington state died of pneumonia, as a result of measles. She was the first fatality in the U.S. from measles since 2003. The woman had been vaccinated for measles and was taking immunosuppressive drugs for another condition. The drugs suppressed the womans immunity to measles, and the woman became infected with measles; she did not develop a rash, but contracted pneumonia, which caused her death.In June 2017, the Maine Health and Environmental Testing Laboratory confirmed a case of measles in Franklin County. This instance marks the first case of measles in 20 years for the state of Maine. In 2018 one case occurred in Portland, Oregon, with 500 people exposed; 40 of them lacked immunity to the virus and were being monitored by county health officials as of 2 July 2018. There were 273 cases of measles reported throughout the United States in 2018, including an outbreak in Brooklyn with more than 200 reported cases from October 2018 to February 2019. The outbreak was tied with population density of the Orthodox Jewish community, with the initial exposure from an unvaccinated child that caught measles while visiting Israel.A resurgence of measles occurred during 2019, which has been generally tied to parents choosing not to have their children vaccinated as most of the reported cases have occurred in people 19 years old or younger.
From there it continues to spread, eventually getting into the blood and spreading to more lung tissue, as well as other organs like the intestines and the brain. Functional impairment of the infected dendritic cells by the measles virus is thought to contribute to measles-induced immunosuppression. Diagnosis
Typically, clinical diagnosis begins with the onset of fever and malaise about 10 days after exposure to the measles virus, followed by the emergence of cough, coryza, and conjunctivitis that worsen in severity over 4 days of appearing. Observation of Kopliks spots is also diagnostic. Other possible condition that can result in these symptoms include parvovirus, dengue fever, Kawasaki disease, and scarlet fever. Laboratory confirmation is however strongly recommended. Laboratory testing
Laboratory diagnosis of measles can be done with confirmation of positive measles IgM antibodies or detection of measles virus RNA from throat, nasal or urine specimen by using the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction assay. This method is particularly useful to confirm cases when the IgM antibodies results are inconclusive. For people unable to have their blood drawn, saliva can be collected for salivary measles-specific IgA testing. Salivary tests used to diagnose measles involve collecting a saliva sample and testing for the presence of measles antibodies. This method is not ideal, as saliva contains many other fluids and proteins which may make it difficult to collect samples and detect measles antibodies. Saliva also contains 800 times fewer antibodies than blood samples do, which makes salivary testing additionally difficult.