Legionnaires' Disease Investigated
Issued by NHS Highland
NHS Highland and Highland Council’s Environmental Health Service are working together to investigate two cases of Legionnaire’s Disease which appear to be linked to Mackay’s Hotel in Strathpeffer.
A woman is currently being treated in Raigmore Hospital in Inverness. She is local to the Highlands and last visited the leisure centre at Mackay’s Hotel on 17 June.
A man is currently being treated in the Western General Hospital, Glasgow. He is not local to the Highlands. He visited Mackay’s Hotel as part of a coach tour and used the leisure facilities at the hotel over the same weekend 16/17 June.
Both patients are over 60. Their contact with Mackay’s Hotel appears to be the only link between them.
The owners of the hotel are co-operating fully with the investigation and have voluntarily closed the hotel. An inspection of the premises has focused on the swimming pool and Jacuzzi. The hotel has not been confirmed as the source of the bacteria. Results of further tests are still awaited.
NHS Highland and Environmental Health Service are attempting to contact anyone who visited the Hotel between the 11th of June and the 29th June by phone and letter.
The purpose of this is to ensure that anyone showing symptoms of Legionnaires' Disease knows to contact their GP.
Consultant in Public Health Medicine Dr Ken Oates said: “The symptoms to look out for are similar to flu and include fever, dry cough, headache, muscle aches and sometimes also breathlessness and diarrhoea.
The risk is low but anyone showing symptoms who has been at the hotel in the past two or three weeks, particularly those who used the swimming pool or Jacuzzi, should err on the side of caution and consult their GP.
Alistair Thomson, the Council’s Head of Environmental Health said: “It is important to emphasise that this infection is not caught from other people and cannot be spread from person to person. There is no indication that anyone who has not visited the Hotel is likely to be exposed to risk - so there is no risk to the wider community.”
Notes to Editors
• Legionnaires' Disease is a type of Pneumonia.
• It typically affects older people, smokers or those with existing chest conditions.
• The bacterium which causes Legionnaires' Disease is widespread in nature but doesn’t usually cause health problems.
• People contract Legionnaires' Disease by breathing in droplets of water which are contaminated with Legionella pneumophila bacteria.
• Most cases of Legionnaires' Disease can be treated successfully with antibiotics.