Deadly bug hits six more in Auckland

Six more cases of meningococcal disease have occurred in Auckland in the past month, affecting patients aged from under 1 to over 80.

Auckland medical officer of health Dr Shanika Perera said two of the six patients had the new “W” strain of meningitis which killed 7-year-old Hikurangi schoolgirl Alexis Albert four months ago and 16-year-old Kerikeri High School student Dion Hodder on October 20.

Hodder was flown to Auckland City Hospital after becoming ill at a St John camp on Motutapu Island.

Another boy at a camp on the island last week was tested for the disease at Middlemore Hospital over the weekend after collapsing when he got home on Friday. But tests found he did not have the disease, and Perera said none of the six Auckland cases were related to any camps.

The boy’s family, who asked to remain anonymous, said Middlemore staff told them they were handling other children as possible meningococcal cases because of the new “W” strain’s non-specific symptoms.

But Counties Manukau District Health Board communications manager Mere Martin said “standard practice” was being followed. “All suspected bacterial meningitis patients are routinely isolated for the first 24 hours of their antibiotic treatment.”

Three of the nation’s six deaths from the “W” strain of the disease in the past year have been in Northland.

Perera said the main strain in Auckland this year was serogroup B, not W. None of the latest six patients to be treated has died.