Friday, New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced that the state was intensifying its polio-prevention efforts after the virus was identified in the wastewater of yet another New York City-area county.
After the first case of polio in the United States in in a decade was discovered in Rockland County, just north of the city, in July, health officials began examining waste water for traces of the virus. The most recent detection included a sample of wastewater obtained in Nassau County on Long Island, directly east of the city, last month.
The sample is genetically related to the Rockland case of polio and gives additional proof of the disease’s widening community spread, according to state health officials. Previously, the poliovirus was identified in the wastewater of New York City and three northern counties: Rockland, Orange, and Sullivan.
Hochul announced a state of emergency, allowing EMTs, midwives, and pharmacists to administer polio immunizations, as well as allowing physicians to issue standing orders for the vaccine. Immunization data will be used to concentrate vaccination efforts where they are most needed.
Dr. Mary T. Bassett, the state’s commissioner of health, said in a prepared statement, “On polio, we cannot take any chances.” “The risk of paralytic disease is real if you or your child are unvaccinated or not up to date on immunizations. I urge New Yorkers to accept no risk at all.”
The national polio immunization rate is 79%, although Rockland, Orange, and Sullivan counties have lower rates.
Officials estimate that hundreds of people in the state may have contracted polio without knowing it. The majority of persons infected with polio do not exhibit symptoms, yet they can still transmit the virus for several weeks.
Unvaccinated young adult of unknown identity was the solitary confirmed case in New York.