This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2011, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Utah County can breathe easy — an elementary student thought to have measles doesn't.
The Utah County Health Department announced Friday afternoon it received confirmation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention "that the suspect case in Payson tested negative for measles."
"While this didn't turn out to be a case, it is still a good reminder for us to check our immunizations and be up-to-date," Lance Madigan, the health department spokesman, said in a news release. "For children, they should have two MMR vaccinations. For adults, if you know you had two vaccinations or were born before 1957, you are good. If you don't know, it doesn't hurt to get the booster."
Madigan said the child instead tested positive for a Parvovirus.
Health officials erred on the side of caution when an initial lab test for a student at Park View Elementary in Payson came back positive for the contagious virus.
The child's 22 classmates who hadn't been fully vaccinated were excluded from school starting Thursday through Tuesday in case they developed measles.
But health officials were skeptical that the child had the virus, since he or she hadn't been exposed to a person known to have the disease. The initial lab test can show false positives.
While public schools require incoming students to receive two MMR doses, parents can sign waivers to exempt their children for religious, medical or personal reasons.
An exempted student in Salt Lake County is believed to be the cause of Utah's latest measles outbreak. An unvaccinated school-age student who traveled to Poland contracted the measles abroad and brought it back to school.
So far, Salt Lake County has logged nine confirmed measles cases and investigated 40 suspected cases.
Salt Lake County's outbreak, which started last month, will officially end May 9 if no other confirmed cases pop up.