Two new Zika cases in King County residents who had traveled

June 15, 2016.Reading time 5 minutes.

Zika virus have been confirmed in two more King County residents who had traveled to areas were Zika is circulating. One person who tested positive is a woman in her thirties who had traveled to Honduras. The other is a woman in her forties who had traveled to Haiti. Both people have recovered from the […]

Second case of Zika in King County

June 1, 2016.Reading time 6 minutes.

A second person has tested positive for Zika infection in King County. The illness was identified in a female in her teens who had recently been in Haiti, a country that has Zika virus spreading actively and is on the list of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) travel advisories. The person was not pregnant at the time […]

Zika in King County: What it means and who should be concerned

May 4, 2016.Reading time 8 minutes.

After we confirmed our first case of Zika in King County, Dr. Jeff Duchin helped us manage our concerns.

Update from the White House Zika Summit

April 1, 2016.Reading time 8 minutes.

Dr. Jeff Duchin, King County Health Officer, is at the CDC for the White House’s Zika Readiness Action Plan Summit to meet with other health officials to share the latest scientific knowledge about the Zika virus and discuss response strategies. We contacted him at the summit to ask him about the latest on Zika. Why does […]

On World TB Day, still plenty of work left despite local successes

March 24, 2016.Reading time 5 minutes.

An X-ray of the chest of a man with tuberculosis. The areas infected with TB bacteria are colored red. Science Photo Library/Corbis

We saw an increase in TB in the United States for the first time in 23 years. In King County, TB isn’t increasing, but our proportion of TB-infected individuals (those who carry a dormant form of TB (“latently-infected”) is higher than Washington’s or any other region in the state.

Required childhood immunizations and vaccine exemptions: The bottom line

March 20, 2016.Reading time 3 minutes.

By Jeff Duchin, MD, Health Officer Media coverage of our recent publication in the journal Pediatrics gave some people the mistaken impression that my colleagues and I want to provide children with a choice to “opt out” of required vaccinations, except for measles vaccine. The fact is that families in Washington currently have the ability […]