ThedaCare is working to protect the community against measles by sending letters to families with children who have not received all recommended doses of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine for their age.
More than 700 kids in 22 states have already been affected and it's spreading rapidly. In addition to the initial vaccine children between 4-and 5-years-old should get a second dose.
"One in 20 kids who have measles will have pneumonia," said Dr. Sharon Rink, a pediatrician with ThedaCare Physicians Pediatrics-Darboy. "One in 1,000 will get encephalitis, which can cause brain damage; and one to two thousand people will die from the infection.”
Health experts recommend people born between 1963 and 1989 get their immunity checked because most people only received one dose of the vaccine during that time.
