South Carolina health officials are warning of “irreversible” neurological damage in children as measles-related hospitalizations climb in the state.

Of the 876 confirmed cases in the state’s upstate outbreak, at least 19 patients have been admitted with serious complications.

“Some of these complications include measles encephalitis, or inflammation of the brain, in children and pneumonia,” state epidemiologist Linda Bell said in a Feb. 4 briefing.

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Bell emphasized that the complication is particularly dangerous for young patients.

“Any time you have inflammation of the brain … there can be long-term consequences, things like developmental delays and impacts on the neurologic system that can be irreversible,” the expert warned.

While the state does not systematically track every medical complication, pneumonia is the leading cause of measles-related death among young children, affecting approximately one in every 20 infected minors, according to CDC data.

A total of 147 students are quarantined across 10 K-12 schools, Bell noted.

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The outbreak also poses a risk to expectant mothers. Because the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine cannot be administered during pregnancy, several exposed women recently required emergency treatment with immune globulin to provide “passive immunity.”

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Bell noted that this is critical to “protect them against the high risk of complications during pregnancy and to protect their newborn babies.”

The measles virus is notoriously contagious, capable of lingering in the air for up to two hours after an infected person has left a room, experts say.

South Carolina saw a historic surge in vaccinations in January. In particular, Spartanburg County saw a 162% increase in MMR vaccinations compared to the previous year.

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“I’m hoping that what we can attribute [the vaccine surge] to is a wider recognition of the threat of this disease circulating in our communities and the desire for people to be protected against the complications,” Bell said in the briefing.

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Health officials continue to urge the public to seek vaccinations, especially as a new case in the Pee Dee region suggests the virus may be spreading beyond the initial upstate clusters through “unrecognized community transmission.”

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As far as the encephalitis and pneumonia fears, “these are complications we hope to prevent,” Bell added.

“Increasing vaccination coverage protects those who cannot be vaccinated, like young infants, pregnant women and those with weakened immune systems.”

Surgeons at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago were able to keep a critically ill patient alive for 48 hours after removing both of his lungs, the hospital reported last week.

The patient, a 33-year-old Missouri resident whose name was not shared, was originally flown to Northwestern Memorial Hospital with lung failure linked to a flu infection in spring 2023.

When his condition escalated to severe pneumonia and sepsis, his heart stopped and the team performed CPR, according to a press release on the case.

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“He had developed an infection of his lungs that just could not be treated with any antibiotics because it was resistant to everything,” said Ankit Bharat, M.D., chief of thoracic surgery and executive director of the Northwestern Medicine Canning Thoracic Institute. “That infection caused his lungs to liquify and then continued to progress to the rest of his body.”

The lungs needed to be removed to stop the spread of infection, but there was a dangerous risk of immediate heart failure.

“The lungs act as a ‘shock absorber’ for the right side of the heart; when you remove them, the heart pumps against high resistance and can fail instantly,” Bharat told Fox News Digital. 

“Another critical danger is that without blood flowing from the lungs to the left heart, the left heart chambers can collapse or form deadly clots.”

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While the man remained on life support, the medical team designed a “total artificial lung system” (TAL) that took over gas exchange (oxygenation and CO₂ removal) and maintained blood flow to the heart in hopes that it could keep the patient alive after both of his diseased lungs were removed.

“A key innovation here is that we maintained the heart’s natural physiology. By using a ‘flow-adaptive’ design, we allowed the patient’s own heart to regulate blood flow, rather than forcing it with a machine,” Bharat said.

“Just one day after we took out the lungs, his body started to get better because the infection was gone.”

“Just one day after we took out the lungs, his body started to get better because the infection was gone.”

After 48 hours, the patient was stable enough to proceed with a double-lung transplant. Two years later, he is back to his regular routine.

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“The patient is doing remarkably well,” Dr. Bharat said. “He has excellent lung function, his heart function is preserved and he is completely functionally independent.”

This was the first successful application of this specific type of system, according to the medical team.

“While the concept of removing lungs and bridging to transplant has been attempted in rare cases historically, those prior attempts faced significant limitations regarding blood flow management and the risk of clots,” Bharat told Fox News Digital. 

“Our system is novel because it includes a self-regulating ‘shunt’ that mimics the natural physics of the lung to protect the heart, and it uses dual return tubes to maintain normal blood flow through the left heart chambers.”

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In a case study, which was published last week in the Cell Press journal Med, experts revealed a “molecular analysis” of the removed lungs, showing extensive scarring and damage. This supports the idea that in some severe cases of acute respiratory distress syndrome, transplantation may be the only viable option.

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Researchers hope that the TAL system could eventually be a viable strategy for patients who are waiting for donor lungs — specifically, those with severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) along with necrotizing pneumonia or septic shock.

“These patients have a mortality rate exceeding 80% and are often turned down for transplant because they are too infected,” Dr. Bharat said. “This technology allows us to ‘clean the slate’ by removing the infection, stabilizing the patient and bridging them to a successful transplant.”

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In the future, he added, they hope to develop durable, implantable artificial lungs that patients can live with long-term, not just as a bridge to transplant.

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