Diphtheria outbreak spreads across three States amid fears one life claimed by the respiratory disease

One of Australia’s worst diphtheria outbreaks has spread across three states amid fears the respiratory disease has claimed a life in an outback community.

The National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System reports 133 notifications of the disease in the Northern Territory since the outbreak began in March.

It has since spread to Western Australia where 79 cases have been reported plus another six in South Australia and up to five in Queensland.

NT health authorities are also awaiting results from an autopsy report about a possible diphtheria-related death in a remote territory community.

Federal Health Minister Mark Butler described it as the biggest diphtheria outbreak in Australia for decades.

“There’s no question this is serious”, he told ABC Radio on Tuesday.

Almost all the cases involved Indigenous Australians so health authorities were working with Aboriginal agencies to try to curb the outbreak, including provision of vaccines, the minister said.

NT Health said it was working with community organisations to undertake a territory-wide vaccination program, focusing on vulnerable people and at-risk areas.

“Vaccination remains the most important measure for preventing, protecting and reducing transmission,” it said in a statement.

Diphtheria can easily spread person to person through inhalation of respiratory droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes.

Respiratory diphtheria symptoms can include a sore throat, mild fever, loss of appetite and in severe cases, trouble breathing, in some cases leading to death if untreated.

Diphtheria was a feared childhood disease and common cause of death in children until the 1940s, when vaccines were rolled out.

Milena Dalton, an immunisation expert with the Burnet Institute in Melbourne, said the outbreak highlighted how quickly vaccine-preventable diseases could re-emerge when there were immunity gaps.

“Diphtheria remains rare in Australia because vaccination works,” Dr Dalton said in a statement.

“Vaccination and boosters remain our best protection against severe disease, hospitalisation and death, and they are especially urgent in communities where people face barriers to healthcare.”

John Boffa of the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress health service said he hoped infection rates would drop as more people were vaccinated in communities where there had been “very good vaccine acceptance”.

The less harmful strain of the disease is cutaneous diphtheria, spread by direct skin contact on lesions of infected people, with symptoms including sores or ulcers and slow-healing wounds.

Vaccination is free under a national program for children aged six weeks to two months, four months, six months, 18 months, four years and 12 years.

Pregnant women from 20 weeks of pregnancy are also eligible and adults are encouraged to get a booster vaccine every 10 years.