‘Possible’ norovirus sickens dozens at youth football championship in Las Vegas
Some 100 children and adults were stricken with flu-like symptoms, including vomiting in Las Vegas in recent days attending and playing in the National Youth Football Championships, according to a KSNV MyNews3.com report Saturday.
Norovirus Image/CDC
“Norovirus is the primary possible cause but we continue to investigate 24/7,” Southern Nevada Health District spokesman Jorge Viote told News 3 yesterday morning.
Those taken ill include coaches and players from two California teams–Santa Monica and Bakersfield.
The exact etiology of the outbreak has yet to be confirmed; however, health officials have pretty much ruled out everything except norovirus at this point.
Concerning the source of the outbreak, one report notes some players and adults started getting sick about 2 a.m. Friday after having Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday evening. The outbreak investigation continues.
The National Youth Football Championships Facebook page posted the following yesterday:
The Vegas NYFC crew is seeing some great football games today as many championships are being decided on the field. A few teams are not playing at full strength with several teams losing a few youngsters due to a nasty stomach virus that is spreading across the Western United States but the teams are stepping up and giving the games everything they have…exactly what you would expect from teams of this caliber! GREAT JOB GUYS AND BEST OF LUCK TODAY!!!
Noroviruses are a group of viruses that cause the “stomach flu,” or gastroenteritis in people.
The symptoms include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and some stomach cramping. Sometimes people additionally have a low-grade fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, and a general sense of tiredness. The illness often begins suddenly, and theinfected person may feel very sick. In most people, the illness is self-limiting with symptoms lasting for about 1 or 2 days. In general, children experience more vomiting than adults do.
Norovirus is spread person to person particularly in crowded, closed places. Norovirus is typicallyspread through contaminated food and water, touching surfaces or objects contaminated withnorovirus and then putting your hand or fingers in your mouth and close contact with someone who is vomiting or has diarrhea.
The highly contagious norovirus is the second leading infectious cause of gastroenteritis-associated deaths accounting for 800 annually. Norovirus causes more than 20 million illnesses annually, and it is the leading cause of gastroenteritis outbreaks in the United States.
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