California well being officers are urging individuals who attended the Kern County music competition Lightning in a Bottle to hunt medical care if they’re experiencing respiratory signs or a fever.
Authorities have recognized 5 sufferers with valley fever who attended the six-day occasion, which was held Could 22-27 at Buena Vista Lake, close to Bakersfield. Three folks have been hospitalized.
Greater than 20,000 folks attended the competition.
One attendee, on a Reddit r/LightningInaBottle thread, stated a competition companion had been hospitalized for 2 weeks with “extreme” valley fever.
“In case you get unexplainable signs corresponding to fever, chills, and complications/neck ache,” the person wrote, “let the medical doctors understand it could possibly be valley fever, though it’s been a number of months.”
Valley fever is an infectious illness brought on by the coccidioides fungus, which grows within the soil and dust in some areas of California. It’s mostly discovered within the San Joaquin Valley and Central Coast of California.
Well being officers say that most individuals uncovered to this fungus don’t find yourself creating the illness, however it might probably infect the lungs and trigger respiratory signs in some folks, together with cough, problem respiratory, fever and fatigue.
In uncommon instances, the fungus can unfold to different components of the physique and trigger extreme illness.
Valley fever shouldn’t be contagious. Previous outbreaks have been linked to mud and dust publicity at out of doors occasions and job websites the place dust is disturbed — in areas of the state the place the fungus is frequent.
Valley fever is on the rise in California, with notably excessive numbers of instances reported in 2023 and 2024. The fungus seems to flourish in moist years.
A 2022 research within the medical journal the Lancet concluded that multiyear cycles of dry situations adopted by moist winters elevated transmission, particularly in areas that had been traditionally wetter. Local weather change is predicted to extend the frequency and length of drought all through the Southwestern United States, probably growing the prevalence of valley fever spores and fungus.
Kern County has the very best incidence fee within the state, and it accounts — on common — for a couple of third of the instances.
State well being officers say that individuals who have visited Kern County in latest months and are experiencing respiratory signs that haven’t improved or are lasting longer than every week ought to see a healthcare supplier and ask about potential valley fever.
Additionally they urge folks to say attendance on the music competition or journey to Kern County.
Attendees can go to the California Division of Public Well being’s valley fever survey web site for extra data and to share particulars about any sickness.
One other Reddit person stated they got here down with the illness two weeks after getting back from the competition to their dwelling in Colorado.
The music fan described a “horrible” cough, headache, physique aches, fever and chills. The Reddit person shouldn’t be certain they’d go once more subsequent 12 months.
“Don’t wish to miss … however I additionally don’t desire a fungal lung an infection once more. Yikes.”
