The number of cases of meningitis linked to the escalating Kent outbreak has risen to 29, health officials revealed today after a further two infections were confirmed.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said in its daily update this morning that 18 cases had now been confirmed and a further 11 were under investigation.
Some 13 of the 18 confirmed cases are known to be caused by meningitis B (menB), and all cases have required hospital admission. Today’s total of 29 is an increase from the 27 reported yesterday, 20 on Wednesday, 15 on Tuesday and 13 on Monday.
Two young people have died – Juliette Kenny, 18, a sixth former at Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School in Faversham; and an unnamed University of Kent student aged 21.
The UKHSA said its laboratories have finished an initial genetic analysis of the strain, which confirms the Bexsero vaccine being offered in Kent ‘should provide protection’.
Going into further detail, it said the strain ‘belongs to a group of bacteria known as group B meningococci, sequence type 485 belonging to the larger clonal complex ST-41/44’ – and similar strains have been circulating in the UK for around five years.
Today, Juliette’s father Michael Kenny said his family’s devastation is ‘immeasurable’ and called for better protection for young people. Juliette died last Saturday – one day after first showing symptoms which were vomiting and discolouration in her cheeks.
Mr Kenny said she had been ‘fit, healthy and strong’ before her death and had completed the practical assessment for her PE A-level on Thursday, March 12.
He described Juliette as having a ‘beautifully positive energy’, adding that ‘no family should experience this pain and tragedy’ and that ‘this can be avoided’.
Mr Kenny also said he wanted his daughter’s legacy to be ‘lasting change’, saying in a statement: ‘We are incredibly proud parents to two wonderful daughters.
A photo issued by the Meningitis Research Foundation of the Kenny family (left to right) Juliette, Michael, Rebecca and Florence. Juliette Kenny died from meningitis last Saturday
Students queue for the meningitis B vaccine at the University of Kent in Canterbury today
Juliette Kenny, 18, died on Saturday surrounded by her family after falling victim to meningitis
| Date | Total confirmed cases | Confirmed MenB cases (subset of total confirmed cases) | Probable cases | Total cases |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FRIDAY | 18 | 13 | 11 | 29 |
| THURSDAY | 15 | 9 | 12 | 27 |
| WEDNESDAY | 9 | 6 | 11 | 20 |
| TUESDAY | – | 4 | – | 15 |
| MONDAY | – | – | – | 13 |
| Note: The distinction between a confirmed case and a probable case was not reported on the first two days | ||||
‘Juliette is a force in this world. With her beautifully positive energy she spread fun, love and happiness to those around her and she continues to do so now. The devastation of her loss to us, her family and friends is immeasurable.
‘Sharing stories of the empathy, warmth and fun that she created is helping her family and friends through at this time. Her energy continues to make the people who love her find a way. The illness took her from us so quickly.’
Mr Kenny said he first became aware that his daughter was ill when she vomited in the early hours of Friday, March 13 – but had no other symptoms at that time.
‘In the morning on Friday, she was taken, by us, to our local emergency drop-in as a discolouration appeared on her cheeks,’ Mr Kenny said. ‘She was given antibiotics and sent by ambulance to A&E.
‘Juliette fought bravely for hours, but despite the fantastic NHS hospital staff fighting alongside her, meningitis took her from us less than 12 hours later.
‘We were with her at the end, and the last sounds that she heard were the voices of those who loved her telling her how very much loved and cherished she is.’
Along with the Meningitis Research Foundation, Mr Kenny and his family are calling for the UK to take urgent action to improve access to the menB vaccination for teenagers and young people.
‘No family should experience this pain and tragedy,’ he said. ‘This can be avoided. There are young people currently battling this and young people still at risk.
‘As parents, we knew our children would change the world and be a force for good. The work to protect young people has started. It needs to be more.
‘Juliette’s impact on this world must be lasting change. Now is the time to ensure families are safe from the impact of meningitis B.’
Vinny Smith, chief executive of Meningitis Research Foundation, said in 2015 the charity’s calls for the menB vaccination to be ‘routinely available’ on the NHS for all at-risk age groups was ‘not taken forward’ as it was ‘judged not to be cost-effective’.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting poses with medical staff at the University of Kent yesterday
Students receive vaccines and antibiotics from medical staff at the University of Kent yesteday
The menB jab was introduced on the NHS for babies in 2015, meaning the majority of young people born before then are not protected against it unless they have had the jab privately.
The Kenny family were not aware that the vaccination is not routinely available on the NHS for teenagers and young adults, and that to have this they would need to pay for it privately.
Mr Smith called on the Government to ‘decide now to save lives’ and highlighted menB’s ‘lifelong impact’, including disabilities caused by the bug.
He said: ‘When we made the case for menB vaccination to be routinely available on the NHS in 2015 for all at-risk age groups, wider protection for teenagers and young adults was not taken forward (it was judged to not be cost-effective within the criteria used at the time).
‘Our concern, then and now, is that this has not fully reflected the impact of menB or the full value protection from a vaccine brings.
‘It hasn’t accounted for the severity of meningitis, its lifelong impact, or the trauma and bereavement experienced by families.
‘People across the country will have seen that impact this week; we believe the UK Government can decide now to save lives and limit the lifelong disabilities caused by meningitis, protecting people for generations to come.’
Mr Smith also told BBC Breakfast this morning that the Kenny family asked him to express ‘just how clearly’ they feel about ensure everyone has protection from meningitis, adding: ‘There is confusion out there, and very understandably so.’
He claimed that people at the age when they are most at risk from menB are not protected, saying: ‘We should take risk out of that as much as we can.’
Today, health officials are expected to face questions at a media briefing after more than 100 students were turned away while trying to get a vaccine yesterday.
The University of Kent said it had closed the vaccine queue on its Canterbury campus ‘due to capacity’ yesterday because it needed to finish the clinic by 5pm.
More than 100 people who had been waiting for a jab were turned away, according to estimates of the queue size.
The university said the vaccination clinic would reopen from 9am to 5pm today, and advised people to be in the queue by 2pm.
Around 700 staff and students were in the queue to get a vaccine at the university by 8.45am this morning, according to estimates by reporters at the scene.
The campus was busy as students and staff lined up outside the sports centre. One student near the front said she had joined the queue at 7.55am.
University of Kent social psychology professor Dominic Abrams told BBC Breakfast today that the scenes outside the vaccination clinic were ‘very reminiscent of Covid’, which is ‘somewhat traumatising for everybody’.
He also said ‘understandably people are very concerned and anxious,’ but the ‘very different’ situation this time is ‘more under control’ than during the pandemic.
More vaccination centres are due to open across Kent as the Government’s immunisation programme expands.
Professor Robin May, chief scientific officer of the UKHSA, said a ‘staffing issue’ led to people being turned away from the queue for a meningitis B vaccine yesterday.
He told Times Radio: ‘Yesterday, it was a staffing issue. To emphasise – we are not short of vaccine. Yesterday, demand exceeded the ability of staff to fulfil it within the time allocated.
‘I would like to really stress that the frontline response for people who are exposed is prophylactic antibiotics, which have now all been given, so people who have been exposed have had antibiotics to protect them from disease.
‘The vaccination that we’re offering now is for follow-up protection, but those students who are on antibiotics are already protected.
‘Nonetheless, we are encouraging people who are eligible to get their vaccine clearly, but the fact that they might have had to wait a day or two is not an immediate health risk.’
Professor May also said yesterday that ‘this is a very unusual outbreak’, adding experts were looking at why meningitis in these cases may have become more transmissible between people.
He explained experts are still trying to work out if the meningitis bug has become more transmissible in the recent cases.
Professor May told Times Radio: ‘It’s certainly very unusual. So typically, we see on average in the UK about one case of meningitis a day. This is obviously a much bigger number than that and so there’s something unusual about this outbreak. We are focusing our investigations on two possibilities, which both may be true, or neither.
‘So one is that there is something about the particular setting that has enabled this bacteria to spread very well in that particular club setting. We don’t know that, there’s no evidence for that at the moment, but that’s one course of investigation.
‘The other possibility is that the bacteria itself has changed in a way that makes it more transmissible, perhaps more likely to cause disease. Many of us carry menB as a bacteria without any problems in the back of our throats all the time. So it could be that this is a bacteria that’s just more likely to progress to disease.
‘We don’t know that – we’ve been working, as you can imagine, around the clock since the discovery of this outbreak to try and understand more about it, including doing DNA sequencing, genome sequencing for this strain and that is due back very, very soon. That analysis is extremely complex. The genome for this bacteria is about 100 times bigger than Covid so it’s a lot more complicated.
‘So it will take us some time to analyse that, but we are very much focusing our attention on whether anything has changed in the bacteria that might make it more likely to spread or cause disease.’
Asked if such an outbreak could happen again, he said: ‘Well obviously that’s something we’re very conscious of.’
He said ‘we’ll be mindful both of the possibility of this particular strain, for example, re-emerging in the future, but also general principles that we’ll learn about the bacteria.
‘As with all pathogens, there’s always much more we can learn, and by learning more about how they work, we hope to develop better ways to prevent them causing disease in the future.’
In addition, Professor May said the focus was on the immediate response in Kent.
He added: ‘I would like to just stress, though, that is not a reason for people elsewhere in the country not to continue to be very alert to this.
‘This is a very mobile population of students. Really important that if you’re not in the Kent area, but you see signs of this infection, you still seek medical help.
‘Essentially, you’re looking for things like a sharp, high fever that comes on rapidly, a red rash that does not fade if you push a glass to it, aversion to bright light, stiff neck.
‘And then symptoms that are kind of very flu-like symptoms, often kind of cold feet, clammy feeling, those kind of things.’
He said the ‘key message’ is ‘don’t delay if you’re showing those kinds of symptoms.’
He added: ‘Don’t just go to bed and think ‘I’ll wake up tomorrow and see about it’, seek advice first.’
Health Secretary Wes Streeting said anyone who attended local venue Club Chemistry from March 5 until March 15 would be offered the jab, alongside sixth-formers at four schools and other university students in Canterbury.
One facility, located at Faversham Health Centre, began administering jabs at 9am today and will remain open through tomorrow.
Additional clinics are scheduled to open today at the Vicarage Lane Clinic in Ashford and at the University of Kent, NHS England has said.
The UKHSA said all patients eligible for antibiotics will now be able to request a vaccination and antibiotics ‘from their local GP immediately – wherever they are in England’. This covers students who have travelled home.
The NHS said that as of 5.30pm yesterday, 9,840 antibiotics and 2,360 vaccines have now been given to eligible people in Kent amid the outbreak.
UKHSA also said 20,000 vaccines from the NHS supply will be made available to the private market to ease the demand at pharmacies from people who want to pay for a jab.
Kent County Council’s director of public health, Dr Anjan Ghosh, said yesterday that he was not yet able to definitively say that the outbreak has been contained.
And Olivia Parkins, 18, who is part of the cheerleading society at the University of Kent, said there have been three confirmed cases within the group – all of whom are in hospital.
Morrisons also confirmed an employee at its Sittingbourne distribution centre who attended Club Chemistry has contracted meningitis.
Some 40 MPs have signed a letter addressed to the Health Secretary calling on the Government and health officials to work with universities across the country on catch-up vaccination programmes, and to improve awareness.
It also said the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation (JCVI) review of eligibility for meningitis vaccines should be conducted at pace.