Authorities are investigating after 150 children developed high fever
following measles vaccinations in Lingbi County, Anhui Province.
 A Chinese student
receives treatment at a hospital in Lingbi County, East China's Anhui
Province, March 23, 2006. More than 30 students falls ill after measles
vaccination at a primary school in the county, according to the website of
the Xinhua News Agency. [Newsphoto] |
More than 3,000 children aged 1-14 in Lingbi's Xiangyang Township were
vaccinated on March 14 by the county Center for Disease Prevention and Control.
The township hospital reported to the county government that 32 students
developed steady high fever after vaccination. But a reporter sent by a
newspaper to schools in Xiangyang found the figure was at least 150. The Anhui
Commerce newspaper is based in the provincial capital, Hefei.
Treatment continued for the victims, all primary school students, whose
fevers were as high as 41 degrees Celsius. Fevers would come back about two
hours after medication drips stopped, the newspaper report said.
Doctors from the county medical center said the victims were suffering flu
and colds.
However, measles vaccines may cause low fever among at most 1 percent of
recipients.
Medical workers drained the vaccines into injectors beforehand, instead of
preparing a vaccination before each student, the newspaper said, citing teachers
at several schools.
A third-grader at Wangji Primary School, to whom the newspaper gave the alias
of Wang Hao, received an injection to treat his fever that morning before the
vaccination.
Wang reportedly told a vaccination worker about it, but the worker gave him
the measles shot without taking his temperature first.
