Parents, Officials, Blast Response To Deadly Adenovirus Outbreak

PASSAIC COUNTY, NJ — The state Senate Heath, Human Services, and Senior Citizens Committee criticized public officials at a public hearing in Trenton Monday in response to a deadly adenovirus outbreak at a Wanaque rehabilitation facility that killed 11 kids there and sickened dozens more.

Chairman Senator Joe Vitale called the hearing to solicit testimony from state Health Commissioner Shereef Elnahal about the outbreak.

Families of two of the child victims, Dorcase Dolcin, 4, and Elizabeth Poulos, 16, attended the hearing, NorthJersey.com reported. Representatives from the facility did not attend the hearing.

Parents of some of the victims took the dais and held up pictures of their children while their lawyer, Paul da Costa, spoke.

"Unfortunately, trust these parents offered to the Wanaque center was violated and they and their children have suffered the consequences, consequences they believed were avoidable," da Costa said.

State Senator Joe Vitale called their absence "troublesome" and Senator Dick Codey said the committee should subpeona them to explain what went wrong, NorthJersey.com reported.

Patients were first sickened with the adenovirus Sept. 26. State health officials were notified of the virus at the facility Oct. 9. The state began monitoring the situation Oct. 10.

The State Department of Health required the facility to separate those sickened with the virus from those who showed no symptoms.

New Jersey Health Commissioner Dr. Shereef Elnahal testified that proper training needs to be done continuously to prevent future viral outbreaks from occuring.

Senator Gerald Cardinale, who represents Wanaque in the State Legislature testified that failure to separate sick patients from healthy ones was "part of the problem."

"We must ensure that every pediatric facility has a plan and the ability to cohort patients to prevent dangerous viral outbreaks from spreading," Cardinale said. "Every parent of every patient deserves to know that their children will be safe when entrusted to a pediatric hospital for care, and we’re going to force those facilities to develop plans that provide that assurance."

Cardinel introduced legislation that would require pediatric hospitals in New Jersey to develop a plan to segregate infected patients together in their own treatment area.

A report released by the New Jersey Department of Health earlier this month revealed lapses in hand-washing and infection control during a surprise inspection earlier in November. (See related: Report Details Lapses In Care At Wanaque Facility Where 9 Kids Died)

Nurses and other personnel either did not wash their hands in between touching equipment attached to patients and themselves or other equipment, nor did some wash their hands for the required 20 seconds they should have after doing so, the report stated.

Adenoviruses are typically a family of viruses that often cause mild illness, particularly in young children. But this particular strain of adenovirus (#7) is affecting medically fragile children with severely compromised immune systems.

Adenoviruses can cause mild to severe illness, though serious illness is less common. People with weakened immune systems, or existing respiratory or cardiac disease, are at higher risk of developing severe illness from an adenovirus infection, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Email: daniel.hubbard@patch.com

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