The NY Slimes continues their streak of journalistic idiocy with this
story:

"Hepatitis C is a dangerous liver disease contracted through the blood
of an infected person, generally through needles or sex or from an
infected mother during birth"

Given that it's the NY Slimes, I was half-expecting Jennifer
Steinhauer to then helpfully chirp: "Its transmission is exacerbated
by global warming."
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May 9, 2008
77 New Cases of Hepatitis Are Identified in Las Vegas
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER

Nevada health officials said Thursday that they had identified 77 new
cases of hepatitis C among patients treated at a Las Vegas endoscopy
practice, in one of the country’s largest outbreaks of the liver
disease.

The officials had previously identified seven cases of the disease
linked to the gastroenterology practice, one of the largest in
southern Nevada, and a single case in one of the practice’s sister
clinics. The infections were caused, they said, by the reuse of
anesthesia syringes among multiple patients.

The practice had not received a full inspection since 2001, although
state policies dictate that ambulatory surgical centers be reviewed
every three years. The licensing agency has blamed the delay on
insufficient financing for inspectors.

“This is a very large outbreak and a very serious illness,” said Brian
Labus, the senior epidemiologist for the Southern Nevada Health
District.

Reusing syringes is “something that shouldn’t happen anywhere,” Mr.
Labus said. “It is not acceptable. What we are focused on now is what
was going on and how do we stop it.”

The outbreak, which began in February, has attracted the attention of
federal health officials and law enforcement authorities, including
the Nevada attorney general and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

It has also embarrassed the state’s governor, Jim Gibbons, who
originally derided news of the outbreak as overstated and a creation
of news media “buffoonery.” (Mr. Gibbons, a Republican, has since
called for the resignation of state health officials, and on Thursday
he called the newly revealed cases “heartbreaking and disturbing.”)

Since February, the county health department has notified 40,000
patients who had visited the clinic that they might have been at risk
for infection with the hepatitis B and C viruses or H.I.V. and should
be tested. About 50,000 test panels of blood from patients have been
conducted in laboratories around the region, although multiple tests
may have been done on some patients and some of those tested might
never have visited the medical practice.

Of those who tested positive for hepatitis C, Mr. Labus said, eight
clearly contracted the illness at the two clinics, and the latest 77
were likely to have been exposed at one of them as well, because the
patients had no other known risk factors.

Mr. Labus added that officials believed there were an additional
10,000 patients whom they were unable to locate, and that more tests,
continuing through the summer, would most likely reveal more cases of
the illness. The effort is believed to be the largest patient
notification effort in the United States.

Since the first cases were identified, the Endoscopy Center of
Southern Nevada has been closed and fined $500,000. Two doctors,
including the center’s owner, Depak Desai, have been required to stop
practicing. (Dr. Desai served on Mr. Gibbons’s transition team in
2007.)

Hepatitis C is a dangerous liver disease contracted through the blood
of an infected person, generally through needles or sex or from an
infected mother during birth. Roughly 80 percent of those infected
have chronic lifetime infections, and the disease is the leading cause
of liver transplants.

The largest outbreak of hepatitis C in North America, affecting 99
patients, was in 2002 in Nebraska, where patients in a cancer clinic
were infected when a nurse used the same syringe on more than one
patient.

In the Nevada outbreak, one patient who carried hepatitis could have
been the root of the other infections, or a variety of patients could
have infected others through the tainted vials.