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Feds back in U.P. to find source of largest fungal outbreak in U.S. history
It’s been more than seven weeks since a small town paper mill in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula became the epicenter of a rare fungal infection outbreak.
Yet the source of the infection remains a mystery.
Health officials have identified, as of April 21, 104 cases of blastomycosis, all connected to the Billerud Paper Mill in Escanaba. Among the infected employees, contractors and visitors, 13 were sick enough to be hospitalized and one died, according to the local health department in Delta County.
Most of the more than 800 mill workers are home, with pay, while the mill has been idled since April 14 to allow for deep cleaning and inspection of the plant and raw materials coming into the mill. Their expectation is to return to work the second week of May.
Federal health and safety officials have visited the roughly 2,200-acre site twice — in late March and late April — and, as of Tuesday, April 25, are in the process of interviewing hundreds of employees in search of patterns that could help uncover the source of the infections...
Feds back in U.P. to find source of largest fungal outbreak in U.S. history
- Updated: Apr. 26, 2023, 12:15 p.m.|
- Published: Apr. 26, 2023, 8:58 a.m.
It’s been more than seven weeks since a small town paper mill in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula became the epicenter of a rare fungal infection outbreak.
Yet the source of the infection remains a mystery.
Health officials have identified, as of April 21, 104 cases of blastomycosis, all connected to the Billerud Paper Mill in Escanaba. Among the infected employees, contractors and visitors, 13 were sick enough to be hospitalized and one died, according to the local health department in Delta County.
Most of the more than 800 mill workers are home, with pay, while the mill has been idled since April 14 to allow for deep cleaning and inspection of the plant and raw materials coming into the mill. Their expectation is to return to work the second week of May.
Federal health and safety officials have visited the roughly 2,200-acre site twice — in late March and late April — and, as of Tuesday, April 25, are in the process of interviewing hundreds of employees in search of patterns that could help uncover the source of the infections...