UK: A deadly outbreak of meningitis started in a nightclub

The outbreak, which apparently started at the “Club Chemistry” club in the city of Canterbury – a three-story club that holds up to 1,600 people – has already claimed the lives of two young people: a high school student named Juliet and a 21-year-old student from the University of Kent. At least 11 other young people, all between the ages of 17 and 21, are hospitalized in serious condition with brain and spinal cord inflammation, and one of them is in a coma. Thousands of teenagers who spent time at the club between March 5 and 7 were called to report to four emergency clinics set up for the distribution of antibiotics.

According to a report in the ‘Telegraph’, the authorities are severely criticized for their performance. The British Health Security Agency admitted that it knew about the backlog of cases already over the weekend, but waited until Sunday evening to warn the public. The delay meant that thousands of young people, who apparently carried the bacteria unknowingly, returned to their homes across the country to celebrate British “Mother’s Day”, raising serious fears of a national spread. Former experts and senior officials in the health system stated in the Telegraph that the authorities “did not learn lessons from the epidemic period”.

Emergency instructions were given to 16,000 faculty and students at the University of Kent, and the disease has already spread to three other schools in the area. Official figures suggest that the vaccination rate among teenagers in the UK is worrying: while Men ACWY vaccines are given to teenagers and have a 73% response rate, the B vaccine (which is thought to be responsible for the current outbreak) has only been routinely given to babies since 2015, leaving many young people exposed. The general vaccination rates in the population in the region are currently stuck around 72% to 73%, a significant drop from the peak of 88% before the corona epidemic – a figure far from granting herd immunity.