Six people have now died and more than 110 have been infected and gotten sick from an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease in New York City. Legionnaires’ disease is a type of severe pneumonia that, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), kills about 1 out of every 10 people who gets sick with it due to complications from their illness.
Cases of Legionnaires’ disease have typically been concentrated in the northeastern United States in the past. Recently, however, that has been changing as more states in the central part of the country including Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Wisconsin have reported more health cases involving Legionella bacteria.
“In general, reported cases of Legionnaires’ disease have been increasing since the early 2000s,” the CDC reports.
Why the increase in Legionnaires’ disease?
In New York City, the New York Post reports, city officials have said 12 cooling towers, including four on top of city-owned buildings, including Harlem Hospital, tested positive for Legionella since late July. The cooling towers that tested positive were drained and disinfected, but Rev. Al Sharpton and civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who are now suing a construction company that did work in Harlem over the outbreak, claim the cooling towers at the hospital filled with rainwater after several storms, but were left untreated…