Owing to a deadly fungal outbreak, the authorities in the US and Mexico have requested the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a public health emergency of international concern. The request was conveyed after the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) informed that two people who underwent surgeries involving epidural anaesthesia, died of meningitis.
Recruiters reportedly lured patients from multiple countries and 24 US states to two facilities named River Side Surgical Center and Clinica K-3 in Mexico for cosmetic operations that may have exposed them to the fungus. Both facilities have been shut down by the authorities.
The CDC is currently monitoring over 400 people who may have visited the facilities to avail the services. They have also requested others who had surgeries at either of the two facilities to get evaluated, even if they are currently asymptomatic.
“All have been notified, and are under evaluation, and we were working with transplant centers and other partners to properly manage these patients who had these organs transplanted into their bodies,” CDC’s Dallas Smith was quoted as saying by CBS.
