A fun new between-sets activity? (Image: WikiCommons/Public Domain)
Summer music festivals come with plenty of health woes—sunburn; dehydration; nausea; various overindulgences. You might dance too hard, or sprain your fingers making devil horns, or permanently trap yourself in a wristband.
This summer, though, there's a new bad guy in town: as the BBC reported this morning, many of the season's biggest gatherings are playing host to a nasty bout of measles.
"Music festivals including Glastonbury have become a hotbed of measles this summer," the outlet writes, citing a report from Public Health England. Reports of the disease have quadrupled since this time last year, with 234 cases reported in the first half of 2016.
Festivals are "the ideal place" for measles to spread, PHE explained, because everyone is hanging out together grooving and fist-bumping each other. "If you think you might have measles, please don't go to any of these big events," entreated Dr. Mary Ramsay, PHE's Head of Immunization. And if your new best friend is covered in tiny red spots, stop high-fiving him and tell him to go see a doctor.
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