Hepatitis Shots Suggested for Bar Patrons

Orange County health officials are recommending that some recent patrons of the Fisherman’s Bar on the city’s municipal pier in San Clemente receive an immunity injection because they might have been exposed to the hepatitis A virus.

Health officials learned on Wednesday that a bartender at the tavern at 611 Avenida Victoria became ill with the virus last week.

County physicians are suggesting that people who were in the bar on March 11, 12 or 13 contact a doctor and receive a gamma globulin injection before next week.

“The sooner the better. There is a 14-day window from the time of exposure,” said Dr. Hildy Meyers, county medical director for communicative disease control and epidemiology. “The injection is pretty effective within the 14-day period.”

The injection is mixture of antibodies that helps the body fight off hepatitis A.

Hepatitis A is an inflammation of the liver, and symptoms include nausea, mild fever, loss of appetite, vomiting, abdominal pain, diarrhea, dark urine and light-colored stools, and a yellowing of the whites of the eyes and skin, a condition known as jaundice.

There were 267 cases of hepatitis A in Orange County last year, Meyers said. So far this year, 59 cases have been reported to the Health Care Agency.

The restaurant case was slightly unusual because “most of the hepatitis A we get here is transmitted from person to person,” Meyers said. “Good hygiene is really the key, and there is also a vaccination that has been available since early 1995. In the U.S., a third of the adults have had hepatitis A at one time or another.”

There is no chronic infection with hepatitis A. Once someone has had the virus, they will be immune for life. The vaccine can be given to children as young as 2 years.

“You can have an asymptomatic infection without getting ill,” Meyers said. “But that is a lot more common in young children under the age of 5.”

If patrons of the Fisherman’s Bar who might have been exposed are unable to get an immune injection through their usual medical care provider, they can contact the county health division at (714) 834-8330.