Health authorities are urging anyone who was in those areas on those dates who start to exhibit symptoms to stay at home and call their GP for advice. The current case is the eighth case of measles recorded in Queensland since the start of this year. Metro North Public Health Physician Megan Young said while they haven’t been able to directly connect the man with any of the other cases, he had not been overseas recently. “We’re at a bit of a loss as to the source (of the infection) but we’re still investigating that,” Dr Young said. “Of the cases that have occurred in Queensland this year, this is the first person who doesn’t have an overseas travel history.”

Dr Young said the fact there had been such a cluster of measles cases in the first three months of the year meant the state had “dodged a bullet” up until now by having no secondary infections. Other than contracting the disease from a known case the man could have contracted it from a previously undiagnosed person, but Dr Young said that was unlikely because measles was so virulent people almost always sought medical attention when they contracted it. “Measles is still infectious up to 30 minutes after an infected person leaves a room, so it’s possible this person has shared some airspace with an infected person and we haven’t uncovered that yet,” she said. There were just three cases of measles in Queensland at this time last year, and 14 cases total in 2018, all of which also came from people travelling to countries where measles was an endemic disease. Early in March, there were two cases in two weeks in south-east Queensland, after one patient visited the Redlands area and another flew to Brisbane on an Emirates flight, leading to a warning for everyone on that plane as well as the Brisbane hotel where the person stayed.

NSW issued a measles alert last week after an adult and a child were diagnosed with the highly contagious disease, while visitors to the Melbourne Grand Prix on March 16 and 17 were also warned of a possible infection risk after a woman was diagnosed with measles. The latest cases follow outbreaks of the disease in the United States and other countries where it had previously been eradicated. Measles is considered to have been eradicated as a native disease in Australia by the World Health Organisation by 2005 at the latest, with no confirmed cases of primary infection since 1999. Dr Young said a standard course of two doses of the Measles-Mumps-Rubella (MMR) vaccine was enough to protect most people from contracting the highly contagious virus. “Vaccination rates are important; the more people who are vaccinated against measles, the less common the disease is going to be,” she said.

“Obviously people are travelling to countries with measles, and if they’re not checking their immune status before they travel then obviously they are very susceptible to it in a place they are more likely to get exposed. The symptoms for measles include fever, lethargy, runny nose, moist cough and sore and red eyes, followed a few days later by a blotchy, red rash. These symptoms can take between seven and 18 days after contact with an infectious person to appear.