A life-threatening virus that causes vomiting and diarrhea at high rates in the U.S., the CDC says

It only took 48 hours for Ben Lopman’s 18-month-old son to go from energetic toddler to completely listless.

Lopmann’s son Ruben was suffering from severe dehydration from rotavirus, one of the most common causes of diarrhea and vomiting in babies and children. He was so sick, he ended up in the hospital, needing intravenous fluids to keep up his strength to fight the infection.

Lopman, an infectious disease epidemiologist now at Emory University, was living in London when his son became ill. It was 2008, five years before the United Kingdom approved a vaccine to prevent the highly contagious virus. The boy eventually recovered.

“It was scary,” Lopman said. “It also reminded me how serious this disease can be for any child.”

Rotavirus, a seasonal virus similar to influenza, has been on the rise in the United States since January. With infection rates higher this time than last year, doctors have renewed concerns that declining vaccination rates could lead to more serious illnesses and higher growth in the coming years.

The virus — which is spread by touching an infected surface with hands, then touching the mouth — is the leading cause of serious illness among babies and young children in the United States, responsible for more than 200,000 emergency room visits, up to 70,000 hospitalizations and dozens of deaths each year, according to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases. That changed 20 years ago when the first oral vaccine was approved.

Data from WastewaterScan, an academic program through Stanford University in partnership with Emory University, show that the virus has been on the rise since January, with levels steadily rising in parts of the US, including the West and Midwest.

“We are now seeing a lot of rotavirus in the wastewater, certainly at very high levels and that indicates to us that there are high levels of rotavirus infection in these communities,” Dr. said Marlene Wolff, WastewaterScan’s program director and co-principal investigator.

Declining vaccination rates

Dr. Stephanie DeLeon is seeing growth in Oklahoma City.

Deleon, associate chief medical officer and a pediatric hospital at Oklahoma Children’s OU Health, has had a steady stream of children admitted for rotavirus over the past two months. There is no sign of slowing down, she said.

Early symptoms include a fever of about 101 Fahrenheit, along with vomiting. “They both go away quickly, within a day to a day and a half,” she said. But then the diarrhea starts, often upwards of 20-plus episodes per day.”

There is no treatment for the infection other than supportive care such as fluids, so children and their families must wait for the virus to run its course. Symptoms may last three to eight days.

Most of the patients he sees in the hospital are too young to be vaccinated, haven’t gotten all the doses or haven’t been vaccinated yet, a growing problem across the U.S. According to the latest CDC data, nationally, 73.8% of children are vaccinated. This number has been continuously decreasing for the past eight years.

“Unvaccinated children are at high risk of serious illness and need to be hospitalized,” DeLeon said.

‘vomiting disease’

Washing hands and cleaning surfaces can help stop the spread, but the virus is hard to kill.

“The virus lives on surfaces for a long time,” said Stanford University professor of global health and infectious disease Dr. Yvonne Maldonado said. “Even if you wash your hands, it’s easy for the virus to stay.”

Rotavirus can infect anyone, but it can be particularly fast-moving and serious in infants and young children, who often require hospitalization.

“The problem with rotavirus is that it’s a vomiting disease,” said Dr. Paul Offit said. “You vomit and vomit and vomit. It’s very difficult to rehydrate someone who is vomiting by mouth and so they end up in the hospital for intravenous fluids.”

Offit said he used to see 400 children in his hospital every year who were severely dehydrated from the virus. He remembers being a pediatric resident and treating a dying child.

“This child was perfectly healthy two days ago,” he said. “It was a healthy, little 9-month-old girl. I’ll never forget it because I was the one who had to walk out to this mother in the waiting room to tell her her baby had died.”

He said the memory sticks in his mind because he helped develop RotaTek, one of two approved vaccines for rotavirus.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 40,000 to 50,000 hospitalizations among infants and young children are prevented each year due to vaccinations starting at 2 months of age.

Studies have also shown that 9 out of 10 vaccinated children are protected from serious illness. According to the CDC, seven out of 10 will be protected from becoming infected

Despite the data, earlier this year, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced changes to the childhood vaccination schedule, including eliminating the rotavirus vaccine and telling parents that they should talk to their doctor before they decide to get vaccinated.

“The virus is still spreading,” Offit said. “So the option of not getting vaccinated is a very real option for experiencing that infection.” While the schedule changes were blocked by a federal judge last month, doctors worry that even the effort to change the guidelines could sow the seeds of doubt among some new parents, who are now reluctant to vaccinate for rotavirus.

“These are young people and they’re getting confusing messages,” Maldonado said. “They don’t know where to turn.”

Although death from rotavirus will never be common in the United States because of access to health care, the rate of serious complications can increase significantly due to vaccine resistance, said UCSF infectious disease specialist Dr. Monica Gandhi said.

“The fear and the expense and the pain and missing work, being hospitalized is a really big deal,” she said. “When the medical community developed vaccines, it wasn’t because 100% of people died, it was because you never want kids to get sick or die.”

Loppman, who studies rotavirus for the CDC, said he doesn’t think the recent increase in cases is linked to recent policy changes. But as vaccination rates continue to decline, she worries that what she experienced with her son could happen to many families.

“It’s actually an extraordinary vaccine,” he said. “It’s also been extensively studied for safety and there’s a very clear, overwhelming benefit.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com