Legionnaires’ case prompts water testing

An Allegheny County Department of Human Services employee who works in Downtown somehow contracted Legionnaires’ disease, prompting the county to check the water in the building where the employee works “out of an abundance of caution,” the county said Tuesday.

“While typically there is not a Health Department investigation or review unless two cases have been reported related to the same source, Allegheny County leadership has asked ACHD to investigate and test

the water ... out of an abundance of caution,” health department spokesman Ryan Scarpino wrote, in part, in an emailed statement.

The county learned about the Legionnaires’ case on Monday and was scheduled to test the water later Tuesday afternoon. Results from the tests are expected back in about 10 days.

The owners of the building at 1 Smithfield Street in Downtown, Burns & Scalo, learned about the case from television news Monday evening, said Rich Romitz, facilities technician for the building.

Mr. Romitz could not recall any prior concern about legionella in the building, which Burns & Scalo has owned since 2010, when the company bought it from the Allegheny

County Industrial Development Authority. The county bought it in 2004 from the United Way.

The building, which is home to about 800 county DHS employees, does not have any anti-legionella water treatment in use with the building’s water system, Mr. Romitz said. Few commercial buildings that are not medical-related or nursing homes have legionella water treatment systems.

The county has not put any restrictions on water usage yet in the building, Mr. Scarpino wrote, something that would be common if legionella were detected in the system.

The pneumonia-like respiratory disease is contracted by swallowing or breathing in water or vapor contaminated with legionella, the bacteria that causes the disease.

Though Legionnaires’ disease can be fatal, people who die from it typically are the elderly or people whose immune systems are compromised for some reason.

While Legionnaires’ may be best known for outbreaks in hospitals or nursing homes — where the rate of fatal cases is much higher because of the condition of those who are infected — people can also contract it from water in their homes, or from water they come in contact with elsewhere, including water features in hotels. The name, Legionnaires’ disease, was given to the disease when it was discovered in 1976 after a large outbreak at an American Legion convention in a hotel in Philadelphia.