The Northern Kentucky Health Department said there are likely more cases as it investigates an outbreak of Cryptosporidiosis, better known as Crypto . And some of them are on the Ohio side of the river as well.
The Cryptosporidium parasite causes gastrointestinal illness. As of Friday afternoon, there were a dozen confirmed and “numerous” probable cases.
Spokesman Skip Tate said in an email Monday that health department officials expect the number of cases could increase significantly. He said official numbers have not changed, but since Friday the epidemiology department has been bombarded by calls from people reporting being sick.
People reporting symptoms since the health department’s initial report said they attended several public pools on both sides of the river.
About half of the confirmed cases reported Friday are associated with Silverlake Water Park in Erlanger. The health department praised Silverlake’s response.
“Super-chlorinating the water would typically kill almost anything, and may kill a lot of Crypto spores, but Crypto is very hard to kill so it’s not 100 percent effective,” he said.