A six-month-old boy came to Graz Regional Hospital with suspected angina. He had to share a room with a one-year-old with measles due to lack of space.
A Styrian woman is beside herself: Exactly two weeks ago she had to go to the hospital with her youngest son because he was suspected of having angina. The six-month-old boy had to spend a night in the children’s clinic at the LKH Graz on February 16th. As his mother found out much too late, her sick baby had to share a room that night with a highly contagious measles patient. The one-year-old is considered the “number one measles patient”. At least ten other children were infected by him in Styria.
Baby wasn’t vaccinated yet
“How can it be that my six-month-old baby, who I am not yet allowed to vaccinate against measles, is housed in a room with a highly infectious child? The strange boy had a severe cough, runny nose, eye inflammation and Fever. He cried all the time. I asked, but he wasn’t transferred,” the mother told the “Kleine Zeitung” angrily.
Ernst Eber, head of the University Clinic for Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, tried to explain in the newspaper: “The one-year-old boy only got the typical measles rash in the night from Friday to Saturday, and on Saturday we naturally isolated him on suspicion “. Unfortunately, the two children were also in the ambulance together beforehand. “That was double bad luck,” regrets Eber.
Lack of space and late detection of measles
The reason for merging the small patients was primarily the lack of space in the hospital, the manager continued. “If our clinic is full, we can’t accommodate even feverish children anywhere else. That’s not ideal, but then there’s not enough space.”
He understands the mother’s anger, but emphasizes: “Unfortunately, the treacherous thing about measles is that you don’t recognize it immediately.” Fortunately, as far as is known, the baby did not contract measles.