Personal Injury Law

If it was not for Thomas Geyer of Quad-City Times and an unnamed reporter at KWQC, the customers of a Milan, Illinois McDonalds might never know where they got Hepatitis A

By Bill Marler, Esq.

Thank goodness for what is left of a free press. If not for the Quad-City Times and KWQC, the folks of Rock Island County would not know the following:

From KWQC - Hepatitis A Outbreak Latest

• Rock Island County now has 14 with Hepatitis A. That brings the total number to 20 cases, with 11 people being hospitalized.
• Two workers at the Milan McDonald's tested positive for Hepatitis A but those tests came back a month ago.
• Even though the first case was confirmed back in mid-June, the Rock Island County Health Department didn't close the McDonald's until this past Wednesday.
• The health department now says it didn't respond back then because it didn't know back then. The health department says it didn't find out about the case on June 9th until July 10th, a month later because the provider who diagnosed a Milan McDonald's employee with Hepatitis A back on June 9th did not report that case as required. As a result, another month went by before steps could be taken.
• The Health Department says in addition to the two confirmed cases at the Milan McDonalds, there are also confirmed Hepatitis A cases involving other local businesses.

From the Quad-City Times - Rock Island County to set up hepatitis A vaccination clinic Monday, Tuesday

• The Rock Island County Health Department will offer vaccination clinics Monday and Tuesday at Rock Island High School for those people who dined at a Milan, Ill., McDonald's restaurant connected to a recent hepatitis A outbreak. The clinics will be from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Hepatitis A vaccine will be given to people ages 1-40, while immune globulin will be administered to people under 1 year of age or over 40 years of age. Eligible recipients of the vaccines are those who consumed food or beverages at the Milan McDonald's from July 6-10 and July 13-14.
• If a person receives the vaccine or immune globulin more than 14 days after they have eaten at the Milan McDonald's, it might not provide protection.
• The county has procured enough Hepatitis A vaccine and immune globulin to vaccinate between 5,000 and 10,000 people who may have dined at the restaurant during the specified time periods.

So, there has been Hepatitis A at McDonalds since at least late May (ill worker diagnosed July 9 would have been infectious weeks earlier).  And, that worker likely infected the other worker and customers over weeks.

One wonders why the physician who diagnosed the worker in June did not alert authorities? 

One wonders if management at the Milan McDonalds knew the worker to be sick?

One wonders why it took Rock Island County Health Department so long to get IG shot prepared?

Full post as published by Marler Blog on July 18, 2009 (boomark / email).