If you had asked me this question five or six years ago, I would have said that the risk was virtually nonexistent, over the past several years, with more and more children being withheld from vaccinations and more and more introduction of measles, I would have said it’s still very low. But today, in the context of the Disneyland outbreak, with it having spread to so many states, I would still acknowledge that the risk is low but it’s much larger than it was, and I would be nervous about that.

William Schaffner

Categorized in : Travel

The supportive care that we're able to provide in the United States is so much better, so much more sophisticated, than what's available in West Africa. ... So we can move that needle of survival way down. Even Doctors Without Borders in West Africa are moving the fatality rate from 50 percent down to 30 percent-I bet we can do substantially better than that here.

William Schaffner

doctors ebola moving

We're very prepared: Infection-control people in hospitals over the past two months have been reviewing all their infection- control procedures because we anticipated just this sort of thing happening-a person coming from West Africa, they were healthy at the time they traveled, but got sick here.

William Schaffner

Even Doctors Without Borders in West Africa are moving the fatality rate from 50 percent down to 30 percent-I bet we can do substantially better than that here.

William Schaffner

doctors ebola moving

I would have thought that CBP would have addressed this over the summer and we would now have a system in place, vaccination is not complicated. We conduct mass campaigns all the time.

William Schaffner

The facilities in which they're detained could not be better desi... by William Schaffner

The facilities in which they're detained could not be better designed for the spread of influenza.

William Schaffner

We get on our soapbox and remind people that everyone older than 6 months needs to be vaccinated every year.

William Schaffner

What the vaccine does is shift the equation in our favor. by William Schaffner

What the vaccine does is shift the equation in our favor.

William Schaffner

That was part of the motivation, of course, to change the H3N2 component for the coming year, the flu vaccine has been reconstituted to be a better match, particularly for the H3N2 component.

William Schaffner

If you get the flu, call your health care provider, treatment is... by William Schaffner

If you get the flu, call your health care provider, treatment is available. It helps.

William Schaffner

These measles outbreaks are remarkably persistent. by William Schaffner

These measles outbreaks are remarkably persistent.

William Schaffner

We've had the dominance of H1N1 yield to now a dominance or at least an equivalence of H3N2, which means that the strain that causes more severe disease is actually producing a substantial amount of late season influenza this year.

William Schaffner

We are having a distinctive, prolonged influenza season. by William Schaffner

We are having a distinctive, prolonged influenza season.

William Schaffner

It's difficult to speak with you because all my fingers and toes... by William Schaffner

It's difficult to speak with you because all my fingers and toes are cramped from being crossed.

William Schaffner

If you become sick, please call your health care provider, because they may well provide a prescription for antiviral drugs that can help reduce the severity and duration of your illness.

William Schaffner

Although it's not perfect, it still prevents many, many infections, and even if you should get influenza despite having received the vaccine, it tends to make a less severe infection. You are certainly less likely to get the complications of pneumonia, having to be hospitalized and dying.

William Schaffner

Older people may have been infected with cousins of H1N1 years ago, and that gives them residual protection.

William Schaffner

The vaccine is not perfect, none of us believe it is, but it's the best thing we have for preventing influenza, and even if it doesn't prevent the illness completely, and this is very important, it tends to make the illness milder.

William Schaffner

The vaccine is not perfect, but give the vaccine credit for softe... by William Schaffner

The vaccine is not perfect, but give the vaccine credit for softening the blow.

William Schaffner

Trying to think about it more positively, I hope the research continues to develop a Zika vaccine in the event we have another early signal of a Zika virus outbreak anywhere in the world, a vaccine could be deployed very, very quickly, and that would blunt the horrific impact of the Zika virus.

William Schaffner

There's a whole spectrum of more subtle manifestations that can a... by William Schaffner

There's a whole spectrum of more subtle manifestations that can actually manifest themselves later.

William Schaffner