Meningitis victim’s mom tells others to vaccinate
Daughter, 23, died of almost entirely preventable bacterial meningitis
Three weeks after her daughter died of meningitis, an Ottawa mother is warning people to check their health records to ensure they have been vaccinated.
Roxsanna Mueller’s daughter Lily, 23, died at Queensway Carleton Hospital on June 27, less than 24 hours after first being sent home from the hospital’s emergency department with a prescription for penicillin.
Mueller said she had not met with officials at the hospital to discuss events around her daughter’s death because she was too devastated.
“I haven’t been able to go there. I just don’t know what it is they could say to me that would make anything change. Maybe in the future I will talk to them, but it is still too raw for me.”
Mueller said nearly 800 people showed up for her daughter’s memorial service. Everyone she has talked to she has urged to check their family’s vaccine records.
“This should not have happened. It shouldn’t happen to any child. They should all have had their shots.”
Bacterial meningitis, which is what Lily had, is almost entirely vaccine-preventable. Infants are routinely vaccinated against one strain of meningococcal disease. A conjugate vaccine, covering four strains, is given in Ontario when children are 12.
Mueller just missed that provincial public health initiative by a few years as the program to vaccinate Grade 7 students began when she was in Grade 9. Her mother said she was unaware of that.
“Had I known this was something she should have had, she would have had it. I was very up on her vaccinations. This one slipped through the gap.”
She said she had been encouraging everyone she met to look into their children’s vaccines to see if they were immunized against meningococcal disease.
Dr. Ron Gold, the former chief of infectious diseases at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children and now senior medical adviser for the Meningitis Research Foundation of Canada, agrees that parents should make sure their children are vaccinated. Even children who were vaccinated likely need a booster, he said.
“The numbers are very small, but it is a devastating disease and it hasn’t disappeared. We have vaccines that can prevent it now.”
Gold said one strain of meningitis — B — is not part of the conjugate vaccine given routinely to 12 year olds and is not yet covered by the Ontario government. He recommends parents ensure their teens get that vaccine, which is now available in Ontario at a cost. He also recommends those who were vaccinated when they were about 12 get boosters when they head to university.
The highest-risk ages for meningitis are under five and between 15 and 25, Gold said. University, where young people live in close contact, is a time when meningitis can spread.
“I would advise the parents to talk to their doctor.”
Cases of meningitis are rare. There were 21 cases in Ottawa in 2017, up slightly from 15 in 2013. Ontario began routinely vaccinating Grade 7 students after an outbreak in Ottawa that killed four students in 1991. More than 250,000 students were vaccinated after those deaths.
Kathryn Blain founded the Meningitis Research Foundation of Canada after her 19-year-old son died of it in 1995.
“Meningitis is vaccine preventable. It is important people are aware of it,” she said.
“As a parent who has lost a child, I can’t stress strongly enough that parents need to recognize meningitis and what they can do about it.”
The foundation’s website, www. meningitis.ca, contains extensive information about meningitis.