Bacterial Meningitis

Doctors at Union Memorial Hospital confirmed yesterday that a Johns Hopkins graduate student has contracted bacterial meningitis, the contagious form of that potentially fatal infection of the brain lining and spinal cord. Marcus Dale Weicker, 25, of Oregon remained in critical condition in Union Memorial's intensive care unit. Hopkins spokesman Dennis O'Shea said the school's health services clinic at the Homewood campus is treating students who had direct contact with Weicker. The city health commissioner, Dr. Peter L. Beilenson, said 23 Hopkins students and 13 members of the Union Memorial staff have been given prophylactic antibiotics.

Students and staff members at the Johns Hopkins University were told yesterday that a graduate student on the Homewood campus had contracted what is suspected to be bacterial meningitis. They were urged to contact campus health authorities to explore the possibility of further treatment if they have had contact with the student. City health authorities are tracking the student's social and off-campus contacts. The student, Marcus Dale Weicker, 25, of Oregon was being treated at Union Memorial Hospital where he had been taken yesterday morning by campus security after describing his symptoms to the campus health center in a phone call, Hopkins spokesman Dennis O'Shea said.

Issues of privacy and public health came into play last week in a case of life-threatening illness when an Annapolis High School student was hospitalized in critical condition with bacterial meningitis.Parents of other students were notified of the illness -- which is mostly spread through direct contact -- in a letter that did not identify the victim.Bacterial meningitis is an infection of the membranes that cover the brain. Symptoms include severe headache, stiff neck, high fever and rash.

A 20-year-old student at the University of Maryland, College Park was admitted to Doctors Community Hospital in Lanham yesterday with symptoms of bacterial meningitis, according to a UM spokeswoman who said the case had not been confirmed but is "strongly suspected."The student, whose name was not released, lives in an off-campus fraternity house. About 15 students who had been in close contact with him have been given a preventive antibiotic.A vaccine is available to College Park students at the university's Health Center.

Zaccheus Chesoni, 63, Kenya's chief justice, died of a heart attack yesterday in Nairobi Hospital, Kenya Television reported. Chesoni had reportedly been hospitalized for two weeks after falling ill with bacterial meningitis. Mr. Chesoni was chairman of Kenya's Electoral Commission when he was appointed chief justice by President Daniel T. arap Moi in December 1997 -- the second indigenous Kenyan to hold the highest judicial post in the East African nation since it gained independence from Britain in 1963.

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. "It is not related whatsoever to the other case in Annapolis."

A prayer went out over the public address system at Archbishop Curley High School in Baltimore yesterday for a senior who has contracted bacterial meningitis. Officials also sent letters home, alerting parents of the student's illness.Students and members of the staff and faculty at Western Maryland College in Westminster were also notified because the student, Michael Petr, stayed there overnight April 9 after touring the college with plans of possibly enrolling in the fall. More than 80 people have visited the campus health center over the past three days to receive antibiotics.

A 16-year-old junior at Annapolis High School died Saturday of bacterial meningitis, prompting Anne Arundel County health officials yesterday to seek people who had come in close contact with her and might have been exposed to the disease.The student, Cara Margaret Petrini, was taken to Sinai Hospital in Baltimore on Friday, after complaining of flu-like symptoms last week.The girl "was relatively better for a few days," said Dr. Sohail Qarni, a county Health Department consultant for communicable diseases.

THE DEATH of 8-year-old Steven Chilton is sad enough for his classmates at Worthington Elementary School in Ellicott City. The boy died Sunday after initially being treated for a high fever. Parents, teachers and school counselors have the difficult task of helping pupils deal with the trauma that accompanies the loss of young life.But the sadness was mixed with concern this time because of fear -- still unconfirmed -- that young Steven died of bacterial meningitis, a highly contagious and deadly disease.