An eruption of the mumps in the Fraser Valley has prompted health officials to warn hoi polloi to make sure they are vaccinated against the disease.
As thousands of children prepare to head back to school, the eruption, which began in a religious community, has already spread westward into Metro Vancouver � as far as Burnaby.
There have been 116 confirmed cases of mumps and another 74 suspected cases since February, according to the Fraser Health Authority. On medium, the region has only 10 cases a year.
Two people from Alberta carried the epidemic parotitis to a religious community near Agassiz that has a low-down rate of vaccinations, aforementioned Dr. Elizabeth Brodkin of the Fraser Health Authority.
"My understanding is their rendering of book is that to immunise would be to designate a lack of faith in God's ability to protect them, and so they pick out not to do that," said Brodkin.
Brodkin wouldn't identify the intimately knit faith-based community only said the mumps outbreak since spreading well beyond that group.
"The virus is kind of travelling underground and pop up every time it encounters somebody who is able to develop clinical mumps that we discern," said Brodkin.
Meanwhile, experts from the Fraser Health Authority were meeting to decide whether extra efforts are needed to control the spread of the preventable disease, provincial health officer Dr. Perry Kendall told CBC News Tuesday morning.
As a safeguard, Kendall said, people should ensure their immunizations ar up to date and avoid share-out drinking gear, straws or cigarettes, because the disease can be transmitted through saliva interchange.
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