{"id":64039,"date":"2025-08-07T02:26:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T02:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/64039\/"},"modified":"2025-08-07T02:26:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T02:26:10","slug":"pierce-county-woman-may-have-first-locally-transmitted-case-of-malaria-in-washington-kiro-7-news-seattle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/64039\/","title":{"rendered":"Pierce County woman may have first locally transmitted case of malaria in Washington \u2013 KIRO 7 News Seattle"},"content":{"rendered":"

PIERCE COUNTY, Wash. \u2014 The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department<\/a> says it\u2019s investigating after a local woman was recently infected with malaria. <\/p>\n

They say she hasn\u2019t traveled, and it may be the first-ever case acquired in Washington.<\/p>\n

As part of the investigation, officials are working with the Department of Health to implement mosquito trapping and testing. <\/p>\n

How could this happen? <\/p>\n

Health officials say there\u2019s a chance that a mosquito bit someone with a travel-associated case of malaria, and then passed the infection onto the Pierce County woman. <\/p>\n

In 2023, the United States saw its first locally acquired case in 20 years.<\/p>\n

What are the risks?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe risk of getting infected with malaria in Pierce County remains very low,\u201d said Dr. James Miller, Tacoma-Pierce County Health Officer. \u201cMalaria is a rare disease overall in the United States\u2014and the vast majority of cases in the United States occur following exposures in countries with ongoing transmission.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is malaria? <\/p>\n

Malaria is a mosquito-borne disease caused by a parasite. <\/p>\n

Health officials say it typically causes fever, chills, body aches, headaches, and fatigue. <\/p>\n

It can also cause nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. <\/p>\n

In most cases, health officials say the incubation period\u2014the time between infection and the start of symptoms\u2014is 7 to 30 days. <\/p>\n

It does not spread directly from one person to another.<\/p>\n

How is it treated? <\/p>\n

Malaria can be cured with prescription antimalarial drugs. It can be life-threatening if is not diagnosed and treated quickly.<\/p>\n

Cases of malaria <\/p>\n

Washington sees about 20 to 70 reports of malaria cases each year, linked to travel. <\/p>\n

There are between 2,000 and 5,000 cases in the U.S. annually. <\/p>\n

\u00a92025 Cox Media Group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PIERCE COUNTY, Wash. \u2014 The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department says it\u2019s investigating after a local woman was recently…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64040,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[14144,8037,41557,1980,10308,47358,292,15916,3149,5268,41588,47359,37162,7828,41821,97,47360,19888,47361,9081,47362,6135,955,686,32574,29899,47363,9083,1107,47364,47365,47366,47367,5195,36029,32338,21409,47368,47369,46940,47370,47371,41984,2316,47372,47373,10641,24798],"class_list":["post-64039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-animal","tag-biology","tag-bite","tag-black","tag-blood","tag-bloodsucking","tag-close-up","tag-dengue","tag-disease","tag-drink","tag-epidemic","tag-fauna","tag-feeding","tag-hair","tag-hand","tag-health","tag-infectious","tag-insect","tag-itching","tag-macro","tag-malaria","tag-man","tag-medical","tag-medicine","tag-mosquito","tag-mosquitoes","tag-needle","tag-one","tag-pain","tag-parasite","tag-parasites","tag-pest","tag-proboscis","tag-skin","tag-small","tag-stabbing","tag-sting","tag-stinger","tag-stinging","tag-strength","tag-suck","tag-sucker","tag-sucking","tag-summer","tag-tropical","tag-unsanitary","tag-virus","tag-zoom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64039\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}