Source of LV lawyer’s illness not likely to be found

Thursday, Aug. 3, 2000 | 11:04 a.m.

The manager of epidemiology for the Clark County Health District says it is unlikely that health officials ever will find the source of Legionnaires' disease that recently made a Las Vegas lawyer ill.

Although the Clark County Courthouse air-conditioning system was tested, it is unlikely that it was the source of attorney Philip Van Alstyne's illness, said Rose Bell, the health district's manager of epidemiology, the study of diseases.

"The source could have come from his shower head," she said. "We almost never find the source when just one person gets Legionnaires'. You need to have a cluster of people and they have to have something in common like they work in the same building or attended the same convention.

"There has to be exactly the right conditions for the organism to grow, so it is very unusual that we ever get a big outbreak of Legionnaires' diseases."

Legionnaires' disease, which can cause pneumonia, comes from bacteria that generally grows in stagnant water, like a building's cooling tower. The contaminated mist is inhaled by the victim, who develops flu-like symptoms such as high fever, loss of appetite, headaches, muscle aches, vomiting and coughing, Bell said.

The disease, which scientists believe may have been around a long time, got its name after a 1976 American Legion convention in Philadelphia, where 221 conventioneers were afflicted and 34 of them died. The source of that outbreak was traced to the air-conditioning system.

The disease caused by the Legionella bacteria cannot be passed from one person to another, Bell said.

She said that while the disease can afflict perfectly healthy individuals, it more commonly strikes people who are "immune-compromised," such as those who are older than 50, smokers and diabetics or those with HIV, chronic lung disease or malignancies.

It is not known what Van Alstyne's health status was before he contacted Legionnaires'. Van Alstyne was trying a case at the courthouse at the time he became ill.

Bell said that Legionnaires' is treatable with antibiotics and generally is not fatal. However, medical experts say that death can occur in up to one-fifth of the cases that go untreated.

"We understand that he (Van Alstyne) was very ill last month but is doing better now," Bell said, noting that the disease has a three-week incubation period.

Bell said that in recent years there has been an average of about a half-dozen confirmed cases of Legionnaires' disease per year in Clark County, which is down significantly from 36 cases about eight years ago. There may be as many as 18,000 cases of Legionnaires Disease per year nationwide.