MIAMI — A woman who returned to Florida's west coast from visiting family in Haiti's disease-strickenArtibonite Valley has become the state's first case of cholera transmitted from thebeleaguered country, where the disease has killed more than 1,000 and hospitalized more than9,000.
"She's doing quite well," said Dr. Thomas Torok, a cholera expert in the FloridaDepartment of Health's Bureau of Epidemiology.
The woman was described as being from Collier County, near Naples on Florida's Gulf coast. "Additional cases are under investigation in several counties," Torok added, but declined to name the counties. Health officials in Broward and Miami-Dade counties on Florida's Atlantic coast, with large Haitian populations, said they have had no suspected cases
Torok declined further to identify the woman, except to say she does not work in a jobthat puts her in close contact with the public, so the chance that she might pass on thedisease is very small.
Haiti had had no cases of cholera reported in decades until last month, when an outbreak quickly spread to more than 18,000 people. At least 1,000 people have died. Officials have not said precisely how the outbreak began, but the strain has been linked to one common in South Asia and suspicion has fallen on unsanitary conditions at a camp for U.N. peacekeepers from Nepal.
Torok said the woman returned from Haiti about a week ago showing cholera symptoms, and theCollier County Health Department confirmed the case and sent samples to the U.S. Centersfor Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta for further testing.
Last week, the state health department issued an advisory requiring Florida doctors andhospitals to quickly test patients showing cholera symptoms -- primarily profuse, waterydiarrhea, dehydration and fever -- to county health departments.
New cases are expected in Florida because the state has about 241,000 Haitian-bornresidents, many of whom travel back and forth frequently, particularly since the Jan. 12earthquake.
"With the setting of an ongoing epidemic in Haiti, we have increased our surveillanceactivities here anticipating that some travelers returning from Haiti will be ill," Toroksaid.
"We're asking travelers who develop severe watery diarrhea, the hallmark of cholera,within a week of returning from Haiti seek medical attention immediately."
He asked doctors and hospitals to report suspected cases to their county healthdepartments immediately, without waiting for laboratory confirmation.
Chances for cholera to spread in the United States are low because of its modern waterand sewer systems, Torok said
"Cholera in Haiti reflects the infrastructure's inability to provide clean water orsafely dispose of sewage."
During a cholera epidemic in Latin America in the early 1990s, about 20 cases werefound in Florida transmitted from those countries, Torok said. But none was spread fromperson to person in the state