Seven children and three adults at a summer camp in Minnesota for kids with muscular dystrophy contracted swine flu this month, contributing to the decision by the national Muscular Dystrophy Association to cancel dozens of its remaining summer camps across the country.
The national MDA also reported swine flu cases at camps in Utah and Pennsylvania. None was fatal.
The MDA of Minnesota wrapped up the one-week session at Camp Courage on Maple Lake, about 50 miles west of the Twin Cities, on June 12.
The Minnesota camp ran the full week because “the cases didn’t show up until the camp was complete,” MDA national spokesman Bob Mackle said Saturday. “None of the cases in Minnesota required hospitalization. They weren’t severe.”
All 10 people who fell ill — among them three adult MDA staff members or volunteers — have recovered, Mackle said.
Golden Valley-based Courage Center, the rehabilitation organization that operates Camp Courage and a similar facility on Lake George in northern Minnesota, “has no intention of closing either of our camps” because of the outbreak, spokeswoman Mary Small said Saturday night.
Small said that four of the 10 who fell ill were in the same cabin. She said camp officials were notified of the outbreak three days after the MDA group left, and the entire camp was immediately “sanitized,” a disinfecting process that it already does on a regular basis. Other groups that use the facility were notified of the outbreak, but there were no cancellations, she said.
The state Health Department confirmed the “cluster of cases” coming from the MDA camp. “We are investigating it with the camp,” said John Linc Stine, assistant commissioner for health protection.
