Epidemiologic Notes and Reports
Respiratory Infection -- Pennsylvania
As part of its commemoration of CDC's 50th anniversary, MMWR
is
reprinting selected MMWR articles of historical interest to public
health,
accompanied by a current editorial note.
Reprinted below is the initial report published August 6,
1976, on
an outbreak of respiratory illness among persons who attended an
American Legion convention in Philadelphia during the summer of
1976.
Following that report is the special issue of MMWR published
January 18,
1977, which announced the identification of the bacterium that
caused
Legionnaires disease. Tables from the special issue have been
recreated
to resemble the originals as closely as possible. A contemporary
Editorial Note
Editorial Note follows the outbreak reports.
A total of 152 persons associated with a state American Legion
convention in Philadelphia July 21-24 have been hospitalized with
respiratory infections. Onsets of illness were in the period July
22-August 3; the majority occurred from July 25 to July 31.
Twenty-two of these patients have died. The deaths, reported over
the past week, were primarily due to pneumonia.
Although information about the disease and its epidemiology is
incomplete, it appears to be characterized by the acute onset of
fever, chills, headache, and malaise, followed by a dry cough and
myalgia. Some of the most seriously ill developed high fever and
died in shock with extensive pneumonia. No etiologic agent has yet
been incriminated. There is no information available concerning
other Legionnaires who may be ill with less severe symptoms.
The patients, among several thousand attending the convention,
stayed in at least 3 or 4 hotels while in Philadelphia. There is no
evidence of increase in respiratory disease in Philadelphia
residents, nor has there been any confirmed secondary spread to
family members or other contacts. There have been several reports
of similar disease in non-conventioneers who were in Philadelphia
at the same time as the convention.
Reported by RG Sharrar, MD, City of Philadelphia Dept of Public
Health; WE Parkin, DVM, Acting State Epidemiologist, Pennsylvania
State Dept of Health; the Bur of Epidemiology and the Bur of
Laboratories, CDC.
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