Bacterial Meningitis

A Baltimore County school official confirmed yesterday that a pupil at Hereford Middle School in Monkton has viral meningitis, and another is suspected of having the brain infection.But school and health officials told parents that viral meningitis is not communicable from person to person and children at the school are not at increased risk from being exposed to the pupil.School officials sent a letter home to parents Tuesday telling them of the sick pupil."Its not bacterial meningitis, and it's not contagious.

THE HEALTH department in Anne Arundel County should reconsider its policy of waiting until test results are final before alerting school administrators and the community about possible public health problems.Health officials said nothing to school leaders or the community Friday when preliminary tests indicated that an Annapolis High School junior was suffering from bacterial meningitis, an infection that inflames the membranes surrounding the brain. The reason, they explained, was to prevent alarming residents unnecessarily.

Anne Arundel County health officials said yesterday that they were trying to reach the families of five preschool children who may have been exposed to bacterial meningitis through contact with a boy who was diagnosed with the disease last weekend and is now hospitalized. Working throughout Easter, county Health Department nurses contacted 85 of 90 families whose children attend the Edgewater preschool with the sick boy or who went to a March 24 birthday party with him. The families were told to contact a doctor to get a prescription for antibiotics.

A Johns Hopkins University student who died Wednesday morning likely fell ill because of a bacterial infection - not an allergic reaction he thought he was experiencing, university officials said yesterday. A preliminary blood test suggested that 19-year-old Gilbert Duvalsaint's death was the result of a meningococcal infection, which can lead to bacterial meningitis, said university spokesman Dennis O'Shea. Duvalsaint had been vaccinated against meningitis, a state requirement for students living in university housing.

About three dozen Annapolis High School students -- concerned they have been exposed to bacterial meningitis that killed their classmate over the weekend -- sought advice from nurses in the school yesterday who were searching for anyone who had close contact with the girl.Cara Margaret Petrini, a junior, died of the disease at 6: 45 a.m. Saturday at Sinai Hospital in Baltimore. As health department nurses interviewed students and counselors comforted grieving students, school officials were annoyed and wondering why the health department had not notified them Friday when it became apparent the teen-ager had the disease.

Travis Blake, a senior at Chesapeake High School, was in critical condition last night at North Arundel Hospital in Glen Burnie with bacterial meningitis, hospital officials said.His illness comes two weeks after an Annapolis High School junior died of the disease, but county health department officials say that there is no connection between the two cases."We're dealing with a different strain of the organism," said Frances Phillips, the county's chief health officer.Cara Margaret Petrini, 16, died of the disease April 10.Blake is a center on the school's basketball team.

Howard County health officials say that they will never know for sure whether meningitis killed an 8-year-old Worthington Elementary School student this month, but whatever caused his death did not infect any other children at the school.Dr. Joyce Boyd, county health officer, said the only way to determine if Steven Chilton died of meningitis March 1 would be to test spinal fluid taken from his body.No spinal fluid was ever obtained, Boyd said.But she said that whether Steven died from a strep infection or meningitis -- both possibilities given the boy's high fever and other symptoms -- the incubation period when either ailment would have spread to other children has ended.

A student at Stevenson University has been hospitalized in stable condition with a suspected case of bacterial meningitis, an often contagious and potentially deadly infection that causes inflammation in the membranes that cover the brain and spinal cord. School officials have contacted other students who may have been exposed and treated them preventatively with Cipro, according to Linda Reymann, associate dean and director of Stevenson's Wellness Center. High fever, headache and stiff neck are the most common symptoms, which can develop over several hours or a day or two, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Janet G. Knight, a homemaker, died of bacterial meningitis related to pneumonia Saturday at Greater Baltimore Medical Center. The Reisterstown resident was 63. Born Janet Georgia Roberts in Devonshire parish, Bermuda, she moved to Baltimore County as a 10-year-old and was a 1959 graduate of Franklin High School -- the year she married Larry E. Knight. Mrs. Knight enjoyed spending time at Ocean City and had been a volunteer in her children's activities with the Reisterstown Rec Council and McDonogh and St. Paul's schools.

As relatives yesterday mourned the death from bacterial meningitis of a Towson University junior, health officials said that research is still needed on the disease that kills hundreds each year. Erica Norton, 20, of Mount Airy, became the third Towson University student in three years to die of the disease and the second student in the Baltimore area to contract the ailment in the past two weeks. Christopher Taylor, 27, a third-year student at the University of Maryland Medical Center, was listed in fair condition yesterday at the medical center.