Suspected-meningococcal sufferer cleared

The 19-year-old woman airlifted from Ceduna in South Australia’s west to the Royal Adelaide Hospital with meningococcal now appears to be clear of the disease.

The 19-year-old woman airlifted from Ceduna in South Australia’s west to the Royal Adelaide Hospital with meningococcal now appears to be clear of the disease.Kirsty Nielsen was rushed to Adelaide with fever and rashes two days after a 15-year-old Gawler boy died from the disease.But the hospital’s director of infectious diseases, David Shaw, says while the disease is spread from one person to another not everyone is susceptible to its ill-effects.”It’s not highly contagious, it can spread from one person to another and if it does, not all of those people in contact with that bacteria get ill.”So it’s a combination of the bacteria and the person that it may colonise in their nose and then some of those only go on to get the disease,” he said.(Source: ABC, Last Update: Wednesday, September 17, 2003. 10:03am (AEST))