Last Updated: 2002-12-11 13:00:45 -0400 (Reuters Health)

FLORENCE, Italy (Reuters Health) - Health authorities in northern Italy are considering a mass vaccination programme against meningitis, after an upsurge of the disease in Lombardy.

"There is no reason to dramatize: so far the recorded cases are within the norm. But if more cases are reported in the next days, we will evaluate the possibility of a vaccination for people at risk and children," Dr. Vittorio Carreri, director of the Lombardy Region Health Prevention Unit, told Reuters Health.

Meningitis is an inflammation of the membranes that surround the brain and spinal cord, usually caused by a virus or bacterium. Symptoms include a high fever, severe headache and neck stiffness.

Bacterial meningitis is a serious, potentially fatal condition. Antibiotics are an effective treatment, but the infection can damage the brain and have long-term complications such as hearing loss and speech problems.

Despite the launch of a meningitis C vaccination campaign in September in Lombardy, fear of the infection has spread in the region around Milan.

In the villages of Abbiategrasso and Magenta, 6 kilometres away from Milan, seven cases have been recorded in a month. The disease was fatal in the case of a 15-year-old boy.

The specific pathogen responsible for these cases has yet not been identified. Test results will be available in the next few days, Carreri said.

According to data from the National Health Institute, starting from 1994 most bacterial meningitis cases in Italy were due to Streptococcus pneumoniae. The next most common pathogen was Neisseria meningititis.

Last year Lombardy recorded 187 cases of meningitis.

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