Should we be worried about meningitis outbreak?

[LittleRed34]

Should we be worried about the current meningitis outbreak?? I don't know if it's fake news, but I saw somewhere that there would be talks of a lockdown, and jab roll out...COVID 2.0??

Meningitis B is a bacterial infection, not a virus.

It can be passed on if you cough or sneeze droplets directly on to another person, but it doesn’t become airborne otherwise, unlike a respiratory virus like Covid.

One in ten people carry the virus in their throat without getting symptoms, but can pass it on through kissing, sharing drinks, or coughing/sneezing on someone directly. The figure for the teenagers is much higher, at about one in four, so it’s no wonder that outbreaks occur in the settings they do.

This information is available from reliable sources via a five-second Google, so there’s no need for anyone to be misinformed unless they get all their information from crappy social media ‘sources’.

Are you seriously saying you can't tell the difference between a brand new virus never before seen, and a bacterial spread we have studied for many, many decades?

If you want to get into the details for WHO specifically, the medical terminology changed a couple of years ago, airborne to mean it an spread around through the air isn’t' the classification any more. Meningitis was not airborne in that system, and this was the system until very recently.

Under the new system, because there is a very small chance that if you are very close and extremely unlucky a cough could be inhaled, it is now both of the new classifications. Meaningless to the public in this case really, but clearly causing confusion or those who don't know how to take in and understand the information out there.

The UK does not use this new classification, the UK considers Meningitis as not airborne, under the definitions of the original system.

So for us, no it isnt airborne. For technicalities, you can find a system that has a strict "any chance above zero of inhaling it ever makes it airborne, no matter how close you have to be for that small chance to happen".

I said people carry the virus. I am tired. I meant the bacterium.

Likewise here. Our GP hadn't the faintest idea about it when we went in together and asked about it after I saw an article in a magazine. Told us he'd be fine as there was a Meningitis immunisation shown on his medical record from years ago! It was only by doing more research ourselves that we discovered it would be out of date and useless being so long ago, so we made our own arrangements and had it done privately.

I’ve look up lots of facts and it looks like there are no more deaths than any other year. I could be reading misinformation as you never know these days.

Sounds right, as it is always around, I think it’s just the fact all these cases have arisen in the same place at the same time that’s causing the concern.

Meningitis outbreaks don't lead to lockdowns unlike Covid or SARS. But the disease itself can be fatal and rapidly fatal, especially in teens, young adults and very young children. If there are symptoms: fever, headache, intolerance to bright light, a reddish or purplish rash that doesn't fade when pressed on, or fever accompanied by severe stiffness and fatigue, it's best to see a doctor (whether GP or A&E) quickly instead of waiting a few days. The fatal cases of meningitis get worse in a matter of hours, not days.

So what you should worry about is not going into lockdown again but getting the disease itself. Be vigilant and keep an eye out for symptoms it is curable when caught early enough, but fatal if left too late to see a doctor (do not try to get diagnosed online or via a phone call). By all means speak to the doctor or practice over the phone before going in to see them, but you must get seen by a doctor face to face, whether in a GP practice or in A&E.

Calm down to a panic.
There have been 2 deaths allegedly caused by meningitis and there are 27 confirmed and suspected cases.
The country has 70-80 million inhabitants. It would be frigging ludicrous to put the country in lock down based on those figures. Although with this government, who knows.
Also, how did they come up with a new vaccine for this new strand of meningitis so quickly??

That strain is not especially contagious. They seem to be very well organised with the antibiotics and vaccinations.

There’s absolutely no comparison with the Covid outbreak.

This. I'm not in the UK but there have been meningitis outbreaks at unis here for as long as I can remember, I don't recall this level of hysteria.

Not true at all!

Doesn't the vaccine only work for around 3 years by estimation? So those vaccinated as babies should get rejabbed as teens?

Its not a new strain and UKHSA has said the vaccine works well against the Men B that has been in Kent.

I don’t want to sound rude at all, but are you aware there are actually quite a few vaccines you can buy that are not part of the NHS schedule? Our local pharmacy (not a chain) advertises and administers them. It might be worth checking with your local pharmacy in case you feel you/family need any. Not all pharmacies do them (boots etc.) so find a pharmacy that does the flu jab and you will see they do lots more!

It absolutely is the prime minister has not mentioned anything about a lockdown these videos you are watching with him saying this are ai

My issue with the vaccination is the fact that I asked the GP and was clearly told ds had all meningitis vaccinations. I appreciate that some on here are much better than me and researched this further but I’m afraid I took the doctor at his word.

I would have paid privately if I had known as ds always seems to get everything and has a few health issues. The example was given upthread of the chicken pox vaccine but I knew about it. Men b as a separate vaccine to those given already - I had never heard of this.

In your GPs defence, your child had received all the meningitis vaccines the doctor (an NHS GP) had available to him to offer, so there wasn’t anything else in his arsenal to give you. It’s not an NHS doctor’s job to know about treatments available privately elsewhere. But Google might have been able to tell you.

I'm sorry but that's ridiculous. An NHS doctor can't be expected to know about the Men b vaccine but ordinary parents should know to Google to check up on information a professional has given them? Come on. They aren't robots just programmed to know what's on the NHS - as a healthcare professional working in the community surely the GP could be expected to know when the vaccine was developed and would have been aware of the debate about who it should be made available to? That's not too much to expect.

Edit - meant to quote the post above mine from @UpTheWomen

We can agree to disagree, then. I don’t expect the NHS to offer advice about any private medical care, I expect it to offer me advice and treatment based on what it has available. If I wanted weight loss drugs or Botox I also wouldn’t be asking a gp. It is the same. The NHS has decided what the standard suite of childhood vaccinations should be based on public health risks, and I wouldn’t’ expect them to be aware and up to date with what’s available outside that in their area. Especially in the internet age. If I was going to them to ask advice about a MenB vaccine for a child outside the standard suite of vaccinations, I would definitely have made sure I’d asked the internet first so I could have an informed conversation.

I've recently read this, too. I thought my DC would get longer protection when I paid for them to have the course of Bexsero - they were born in 2010 and 2013 so missed getting it on the NHS. I think they were vaccinated in 2015 so I presume they will need boosters. It should definitely be available on the NHS. If they give a Men ACWY to teens then they should give a Men B (or two).

A Men B jab is not the same as Botox ffs. It's on the NHS schedule now, has been for babies born since 2015. So of course we should expect doctors to know of its existence and know which children would and wouldn't have received it. Although there is a suggestion that those vaccinated as babies would need boosters as teens anyway.

I said we could agree to disagree.

Of course I agree with you and you are completely right but I’m afraid it didn’t occur to me that being told he was fully vaccinated meant that there were other things available. I stupidly thought that meant EVERYTHING and not that I should know to google and find there was actually something else. That’s obviously my failing for not finding out about it.
Also if I had googled I would probably have been sceptical about something that the GP hadn’t mentioned.

Anyway there’s not much any of us can do now other than hope the peak is over, educate our children on what to look out for and pray for those who have been affected. And as soon as the vaccination becomes available I’ll be booking it.

I’m relieved to know my son’s university has been sending out emails almost daily with updates on the situation and reminders of symptoms etc. Hopefully this will have made a lot of people more aware.

It's not a new strain.

The guidance from the following all state aerosols are a mode for transmission:
UK NICE, UK green book chapter 22 on meningitis, EU Centre for Disease Control.

Until earlier this week, the WHO and NI PHA did too but they conveniently erased mention of aerosols this week.

"Close contact" is not a mode of transmission- the bacteria has to get from one person to another somehow and in this case it could be both aerosols and / or drops of saliva.

In this situation of doubt, best to apply precautionary measures and take airborne mitigations as well. Ventilation, HEPA purifiers, and FFP2 masks that fit snugly.

Ongoing research at Bristol University is also looking at how the bacteria survives on aerosols from human exhalations, here is their July 2025 update:
During the past 12 months, Mia and the team have characterized the aerosol survival of different Neisseria meningitidis strains- serogroups A, B and C – in both artificial and real human saliva. They have found potential mechanisms for what drives death of the aerosolised bacteria in the artificial saliva.

They have identified that real human saliva provides a significant protective effect compared to artificial saliva and prolongs survival, irrespective of relative humidity.

The team have now started to investigate the potential reasons for the protective effect of real saliva. www.meningitisnow.org/meningitis-explained/research/current-research-projects/meningococcal-meningitis-university-of-bristol/